Velimai picked the sacre up and held it out, feathery eyebrows raised in suggestion. Chrysabelle knew exactly what that suggestion was.
She shook her head. ‘You know the price Maris paid for libertas.’
The wysper shrugged as if to say it had been worth it.
Careful not to make contact with Velimai’s skin, Chrysabelle took the gleaming sword. She hefted its familiar weight, wrapped her fingers around the hilt with ease. The grip was fitted to Maris, but it wasn’t uncomfortable; the weapon’s blood magic was tuned to her aunt but not unresponsive. Chrysabelle sliced it through the air, testing, remembering. This sacre was no different from her own, save the blood that filled the hilt and the gold that decorated both her aunt’s body and the wafer-thin blade. The red leather-wrapped handle, the signum dancing over the metal … even the sour-sweet tang of the weapon was the same. Except that this sacre had been used to kill. To gain freedom. Again, she shook her head.
‘Only as a last resort. Only … only if there is no other option.’ Somehow, she knew there wouldn’t be. Whether because of Mal’s lurking dementia or her own desperate need to separate herself from this mad life, she would end up raising her blade against him. The feeling sank into her bones, spreading a lingering sadness through her.
Velimai retrieved the sword’s red leather sheath from behind the cracked vase and handed it to Chrysabelle, who took it without protesting further. The weapon was valuable, and Velimai certainly didn’t need it.
Of all the vampires she’d ever known, Mal was the first she’d ever felt sorry for. No, not sorry for. That wasn’t it. She empathized with him. His desire to be free. She understood it. Wanted it for herself.
She sheathed the sword and slung its crimson strap over her shoulder and across her chest. Her body welcomed the subtle weight like the embrace of an old friend.
Despite everything she knew about him, everything he’d been, everything he’d done, he seemed … the most in need of help. A vampire in need of help. She’d never entertained such a thought before.
Perhaps he wasn’t the only one going mad.
Chapter Twenty
Mal had found nothing useful around the grounds, except a better understanding of how wealthy a woman Chrysabelle’s aunt was. The yacht parked in the deepwater slip had to cost an unbelievable sum. It made his own accommodations look reef-worthy.
He ended his search in the shadows at the front of the house and settled against a palm to watch Chrysabelle inside. She’d left the door open. Perhaps so he could see her? Interesting, but unlikely. Probably to allow for a quicker exit.
Her perfume wafted past, borne on the breeze, and he indulged his basest needs by inhaling until he was full. Now that he’d had Chrysabelle’s blood, her scent didn’t raise the same wildness in him. Instead, the effect was something new and not altogether welcome. The feeling of strange satisfaction, of knowing he’d tasted her, that didn’t bother him. It was the possessive pang of need to have her again that set him on edge. Whether that uninvited urge came from tasting her blood or her mouth, he didn’t know. What he did know was that their kiss should not have happened. His lip curled in disgust, but the sweetness of her mouth still played across his tongue.
Chrysabelle stood in the foyer, the wysper at her side. The wysper had given Chrysabelle her aunt’s sword, and she now balanced the sword with a grace that testified to her years of training. Flashes of reflected silver danced over her face. The glimmer mixed with her signum and made her look like some otherworldly goddess cast in precious metals.
Only her conversation with the wysper ruined the effect. The emotion he felt from her confused him, so he ignored it. Too many female-free years had gone by for him to bother trying to understand a woman now.
He narrowed his eyes. If she thought to challenge him for her treasured freedom, she wouldn’t find him a very available opponent. Not that he wouldn’t fight her if need be, he just didn’t expect to live through this trip to Romania. Corvinestri was the seat of the House of Tepes. The vampire who’d sired Mal was from there. The vampire he’d killed. There was little chance he could show up in that hidden city without a reckoning. After all, the nobility had tried to eradicate him once before and had thought they’d succeeded. Proving them wrong would be a terrible blow to someone’s ego. And that someone would want to put things right. If that meant the chance to take Shaya’s murderer down with him, so be it.
He was done living anyway. He’d had enough of this hell on earth. How much worse could the real one be?
Chrysabelle sheathed the sword, threw the strap across her body, and made motions to leave. He peeled off the palm and headed toward the house. Fi came around from the side yard.
‘There you are,’ she called.
‘Here I am.’
Doc pulled the car alongside the house and jumped out, leaving the door open. ‘We gotta roll, man. Sun’s coming.’
‘I know. I can feel it.’
‘I know you can, but Goldilocks in there might not be aware.’
Chrysabelle stepped out of the house, thankfully leaving the wysper behind, who quickly shut the door. ‘I know what time it is. The vampires who took my aunt certainly do too. I need to find where they could have gone to spend the day.’
She glanced at Mal. Something ugly flashed through her gaze and rolled over him. Pity? Sympathy? Whatever it was, he wanted none of it. She broke eye contact to adjust the buckle on the sword’s strap, now nestled between her breasts. ‘Who would know the locations of those kinds of safe houses?’