Chapter 7
Seven
Lifting his head back up the look Asher gives me is almost pitiful.
“Truly, Mavyn, I’m so, so sorry,” he nearly. . . pleads? Begs? Though I wouldn’t know what he’s begging for. Maybe for me to forgive him? “I’m bound in Stone House and Thorne is president of it. Unless I go through the full process of leaving whatever Thorne says goes.”
A slip of panic works its way through my system. Combined with the lack of blood in my veins it’s not a very good combination.
“What did he say?” I murmur.
Wiping his hand down his face, he looks at the floor. “Monday when he called me he said he just wanted to know about you. He wanted me to tell him everything I knew.”
My heartbeat spikes but I don’t move from my position and wait. I need to wait.
“I didn’t have a choice,” he pleas. “I told him everything I knew about you, which wasn’t a lot to begin with.
Most of it was what you had already outed in the infirmary.
I told him how you slept all last weekend and about the blood oath.
He had asked what your blood tasted like and I swear Mavyn, I told him it wasn’t good. ”
Both Jullia and Hanna stay quiet, though the former looks cataclysmic and the latter is bouncing her eyes back and forth between me and Asher with curiosity and slight suspicion.
“I had to tell him the truth for everything else, but that was one thing I didn’t tell him about. I said it didn’t taste as bad as I thought a vampire’s would, but it was still stale.”
Hanna’s eyes slightly widen as she stares at me and Jullia shakes her head with frustration.
“Okay,” she huffs. “First of all, why does Thorne care so much? With that you also need to tell us what happened today. And second, why would you lie about what Mavyn’s blood tastes like? Why does it matter?”
Did I not just agree with myself about trying to keep my secrets secret? What a fucking bitch of a situation. Maybe the universe hates me.
But. . . at least my anxiety goes down. The panic that was reverberating in my chest subsides and I let out a long breath I didn’t realize I had been holding.
“She’s not a vampire,” Asher answers. To which I give the best performance of my life by giving him my most confused look accompanied by a ‘huh’.
Asher blinks at me as he sits up and stares at me. Surprised and confused at my reaction.
“What? No!” God this better be convincing. “The devil who scarred me used weapons with blue belladon. That’s why I still have clear scars even now. The poison is embedded in the scar tissue and over the years has slowly seeped into my blood. I’m immune to the one thing that will kill anything.”
Turning my face to the ceiling I close my eyes and sigh. All that I’m saying is all technically not a lie. That is the reason my blood tastes good and I smell like the flower. Even if I could be turned into a vampire I would never have that rotting scent or taste.
“I’m more immune to blue belladon than what should be possible. And because the flower has been said to taste like the best thing you could ever taste, I don’t want others who drink blood to go seeking it.”
Asher’s confusion evens out as he nods. “That’s why it helped neutralize Thorne’s blood and help heal me. If you mix a small enough concentrate with rucksile it becomes like a super healing tonic.”
I nod. “The deadliest poison known to all, and yet you can make a lot of healing remedies with it if you know what you’re doing.”
Jullia holds out her hands as she shakes her head. “Okay, okay, okay. That explains that, but why did Thorne want to know about it and why did he beat you to within an inch of your life, Asher?”
He rubs his face again. “The last thing he told me Monday was to get Mavyn to go to at least one of the parties. I don’t know why or what he wants but since last night was the first party he threw I guess he expected you to be there.
” He looks up at me. “When we didn’t show he held a meeting today to which he asked me why you weren’t there.
I told him I didn’t think you would be attending and suggested he just leave you alone. This is the aftermath of that.”
Jullia’s face falls as she goes to sit on the bed with him. He wraps his arms around her as her shoulders start shaking.
Staring off into an empty space, I cross my arms and think.
I’m guessing he still doesn’t believe I’m a vampire.
With all the proof he and the other celestials have been trying to seek, plus my unusual behavior – and I’m sure being a blood demon Thorne can scent my blood and the sweetness to it – it makes sense.
What doesn’t make sense is why they care.
Aside from Thorne wanting to drink my blood, it shouldn’t matter.
“Thank you, Asher.” I tilt my head at him. “I would prefer if no one knew about my blood. Not just because people would want to drink it, but because I don’t care to tell them how I happened to become this way.”
He nods and then Hanna steps in.
“Is that why you need to sleep and eat, even for being a vampire? Did the poison change your biology, even after you were turned?”
Good. I wasn’t sure if this excuse would work, but it seems being the only known person alive with the one thing that does kill all in her veins I guess I can make my own stuff up. Even if I’m not technically lying.
“I’m assuming. Even before I tended to need a lot of sleep and I would eat a lot of food. My guess is that it takes a lot of energy from my body to keep the poison from eating me alive. It’s why I eat a lot of nutrient rich foods.”
They also taste good, but I don’t specify that.
“It hasn’t been so extensive the last couple years, either I’ve been able to manage it better or my body has adapted to it. That’s the only anomaly I could think of that would make a newly turned vampire need food and sleep and not have a bloodlust.”
Hanna squints at me. “Makes sense, but you’re saying you’ve never had a bloodlust? Even right after turning?”
If I was going to be honest I would say I’ve only once gone into a bloodlust, but that was long before I had supposedly turned into a vampire. Which means I can’t say that.
“I was hungry afterward, but not in a bloodlust hungry. Actually,” I add, “they had put me in a cell for a couple days before an advisor for the Mage Board came out to see me. He cut his wrist and even then, after not having any blood and not being given regular food, I didn’t so much as twitch at the scent. ”
Both Hanna and Asher give me perplexing expressions. I’m sure Jullia would be too but her face is still buried in Asher’s chest.
“But anyways,” I stare straight at Asher, “thank you for keeping that secret from Thorne. And I’m sorry he beat you up because of it.”
He shrugs it off and finally Jullia straightens out of his hold.
“But,” she interjects, “what do we do now?”
All four of us stay silent. True. With Thorne still having a suspicion and with his beating to Asher I doubt he’ll just drop it.
I wonder if I threaten him with Nana he’ll stop.
She’s not much when you first look at her, and she’s had over a thousand years to control and hide her magical energy and aura.
And as a bone witch she has power greater than most beings.
Actually, that might not be a bad plan.
“What?” Jullia blurts. I look at her looking straight at me. “What are you thinking?”
A slow grin curls on my lips as I continue thinking about it. Not that I would have any way to pull through with my threat, but maybe announcing it is enough. Especially if I use her blood I have stored in one of my vials.
“I think we should go to his party tonight.” All three of them look at me like I’ve grown three heads. “What’s a blood demon most afraid of?”
Now all three of them look like I’m crazy. It only makes me smile more.
“Uhh, something that can kill them?” Hanna tries.
I shrug. “More or less, yeah sure. I guess I should have said who. My point though, a blood demon is only as powerful as their blood and body is. Take away one of those and they’re crippled. What is the one race known for controlling bodies?”
Asher laughs in disbelief. “You’re insane. How are we going to find a bone witch willing to help us? Witches are more or less extinct now.” At least I didn’t have to spell that out. I guess Nana was right about that being a universal truth after all.
Taking off another charm from my necklace – this one a long thin vile – I unscrew the lid and let the scent waft into the air. Nana had said it was a precaution, just in case I needed an additional threat I could back it up.
Asher’s eyes widen at that and Jullia stares at it with questions. Of course she would, not all races can scent things the way others can.
“This is the blood of a bone witch. Nana, she works in the kitchen at the brothel.” I screw the lid back on and chain it back to my necklace. “So, we go to the party and if Thorne tries anything again I threaten to sick who has always been like a grandmother to me on him.”
The three of them continue watching me like I’m not real.
“What kind of fucking place were you living at before you came here?”
I just laugh at Hanna. “I told you. A brothel. Well, actually it’s a strip club in New York, but behind closed doors it’s a brothel. It’s home.”
I miss it. But no time for reminiscing. Jullia agrees with my plan and Hanna goes along with it because she says she was going to be hanging out with us anyway. Asher looks nervous about it but doesn’t go against it.
Jullia kicks Asher out for now as the three of us get ready. Jullia pulls dresses and tops from her wardrobe for the three of us to wear as Hanna gets out Jullia’s makeup kit.