I can’t complain too much though, when ten minutes later a little groan of pleasure embarrassingly escapes my lips as the man digs his hands into my muscles. Expertly, he rubs, soothing, relaxing.
I really should thank Cyrus. It was a thoughtful move.
I get the impression he wants something from me. And as I think about it, I know exactly what it is.
He wants me to agree to let him kill me early.
My skin tingles as I think back to what happened last night. When he was brushing his skin against mine. The heady look in his eyes.
I can’t lie. That was desire pulsing through my own veins.
But what is it that Cyrus really wants from me? Cyrus says and gets what he wants, so if he wanted me, for whatever primal or romantic purposes, I think he would just say it. And he had this urgency from the first sixty seconds of our meeting.
Desire might be evolving from it, but that’s not what this stemmed from.
An hour later, the masseuse leaves and I shower, rinsing all the oils from my body and hair. When I step out of the bathroom, I’m glad I wear a robe, because two women wait for me. One wielding a rolling bag of hair stuff, another filled with cosmetics.
Nervously, I watch the clock tick closer and closer toward two o’clock. These women obviously know what they’re doing. The one styles my hair into a sweeping, elegant up do, with loose curls and strands framing my face. She places a golden laurel branch into one side of it.
The other expertly applies my make-up. Dark and golden and fierce. But surprisingly, she doesn’t use mass amounts of it. Just enough to highlight my natural features, and enough to make me look the part of someone strong enough to stand as a human in a room full of vampires.
They finish at a quarter to two, and offer to help me into my dress.
Nervous, I zip the garment bag open, scared to see Cyrus newest pick for my wear.
Gold.
So much gold.
The women oo and ah over the dress as carefully, so carefully, they help me into it.
It’s a mermaid style, hugging my hips and the skirt fans out just above my knees, spilling in soft, golden silk to the floor.
The upper half hugs my hips, my waist, my chest. A halter top circles my neck before splitting down the middle, exposing the space between my breasts, dipping down to nearly my bellybutton before closing up again. It is adorned entirely with golden feathers. Soft, shimmering.
I step in front of a mirror, and even my breath is taken away.
I look like…like a goddess. The goddess of phoenixes, wife of Midas. Ready to blind the world, or burn it to the ground.
“It’s…” I breathe. “Incredible.”
But when I turn to thank my helpers, they’re already gone.
My heart leaps into my throat when I look at the clock and find it five minutes to the hour. I slip my feet into the matching gold sandals and walk out of the suite.
My heart pounds, faster and faster as I rise, headed back up to the top floor.
And I realize, it’s because of Cyrus.
I keep picturing his reaction to seeing me.
Suddenly the doors slide open.
It’s a black and gold wonderland. The lights overhead reflecting off the mirrors have changed from blue and purple to gold. Everyone who mills about wears black, but gold masks adorn their faces.
Across the room, my eyes immediately search for him, and there he is. Sitting upon his throne, wearing that crown.
Cyrus’ eyes lock with mine.
He rises.
And slowly smiles.
The rest of the room seems to sense a shift. The space grows quieter. And slowly I feel eyes turn in our direction.
I take a step forward. My heart races.
Cyrus also steps forward.
It takes an eternity to cross the great hall. The pressure of so many eyes watching is intense, intimidating. But I meet Cyrus’ eyes. And like locking in, I’m drawn toward him, one step at a time.
Finally, we meet in the middle.
Cyrus extends a hand, and I place mine in his. He takes a deep bow, reverently pressing a kiss to my knuckles.
“Ravishing doesn’t quite describe the way you look, Logan,” he says as he looks up at me from beneath his eyelashes.
Thump, thump, thump my heart crashes against my ribcage.
Suddenly, the sound of a string quartet fills the space, one long, drawn out note, rising to a cliff, approaching the drop off.
Cyrus wraps his other hand around my waist and I draw in a quick breath at his nearness. He clasps my other hand, holding it up and out.
And with that mischievous, dubious smile, he leads me into the dance.
I am not a clumsy person. But I’ve certainly never been a dancer. Yet, with Cyrus leading me, we elegantly glide over the black marble floor, one sweeping step at a time.
“Does it feel real yet?” Cyrus whispers. “This life that awaits you?”
Everything from this weekend flashes through my mind. The wealth. The fangs. The blood. The brutality and strength.
“I think I understand now,” I say. I can’t look away from his eyes. “It’s real. I still just don’t know what my place will be in it once this time is up.”
“That will become more clear once you Resurrect,” he says. His grip on me tightens just slightly. “I promise, you will find your place, Logan Pierce.”
“And what if I am not what you hope when I wake up?” I say. A painful monster takes up residence in my chest at the implications. “Will you just walk away then? Once you have your answer, then am I just on my own and you’re done with me?”
He doesn’t immediately respond. He studies me, my face. My hair. His eyes drop to the space between us. His eyes slide closed and I hear him take in a deep breath. We slowly turn and he pulls me just slightly closer before looking back up and meeting my eyes.
“Will you not be so very eager for me to walk away and leave you to yourself?” he finally asks.
And my feet still for a moment.
I stare into Cyrus’ eyes.
He literally walked into my life with the intent to kill me. I’ve watched him do terrible, dangerous things. I’ve witnessed his temper and his wicked delight at the pain of others.
But I’ve seen that pain. I’ve witnessed that vulnerability and loneliness.
What I said to Amelia is true. He can take my acid. My bitterness.
“I think now that my eyes are open, it will be difficult to go back,” is all that I can answer with honestly.
He pauses for a beat. But then he pulls me closer, and leads me into the dance once more.
The song ends, leading into another, and now the House of Valdez joins in. It’s old. Choreographed. But by watching the others, by following Cyrus’ lead, I go through the motions and steps without looking like a fool.
When it ends, Cyrus takes my hand and leads me toward the throne. I sit in the one beside him, turning my eyes out toward the crowd.
“Why didn’t you tell me who you were right away?” I ask, watching Edmond dancing with a young woman with brilliant red hair. He twirls her and pulls her in close, smiling down at her.
“We made a unique bargain,” Cyrus says. He watches the crowd as well. “That I had to get to know you. I did not believe you would behave as genuinely if you knew just who I was.”
I shake my head. “I still don’t, really. You, being King. I think I have a few questions.”
He looks over, his eyes fixing on my lips. “Ask them, and I will do my best to answer them.”
Nothing ever is a straight answer in the world of vampires.
“Are you King over all of them?” I ask. “You told me there are…twenty-seven Houses around the world. The Royal and the Born. Are you King over them all?”
“Yes,” he says, still staring at my lips.
“That’s the entire world,” I breathe. “How have you commanded all their respect?”
His eyes rise up to mine and it sets my skin o
n fire. “Because I created them all.”
The words steal my breath. They’re too big. “What does that mean?”
Cyrus looks away, observing the vampires before him, the Born and the Royal. “I told you I am old. So old I have no idea how many millennia or centuries have passed anymore.”
Tingles work their way up my arms, down the back of my neck, along my spine.
“I was always a curious man,” Cyrus continues to explain. “A man who wanted to understand everything. To see what changes could be brought through science. And I knew I could never learn everything I desired in the short amount of days I would roam this earth.”
I feel it. Time. Like a tangible thing Cyrus has invited as a special guest to this ball. It rolls in, overwhelming me.
“I became obsessed with my own immortality,” he continues. “And so, I created the cure. With magic and science. I became what I am today.”
Magic. Science.
“You made yourself immortal?” I question.
Cyrus nods. “I was strong. Keen. I felt infinite and unstoppable.”
His hand curls into a fist. His jaw tightens and he watches as his knuckles turn white. “But I was cursed for my ambitious desires. I was no longer human. But now…I craved what pulsed through their veins. And my predator instincts, that science I had used, it made it so easy.”
The image of him sinking his fangs into that woman’s neck flashes before my eyes.
“I am the first vampire,” Cyrus says. “The genesis of a new species.”
It’s incredible, really. If what he says is the truth. And every nerve in me, so aware and keen and on overload, says that it is.
“My wife,” he says, and the words nearly choke in his throat. His eyes drop down, go hazy. “She was at my side this entire time, but when I ended the first human life by draining him of his blood, she was afraid of me.”
This. This is the pain I see buried so deep in the man beside me.
“She wanted me to find a way to reverse it. But I couldn’t.” He shakes his head. “I didn’t want to. I wanted her to join me. So that we could be together. Forever.”
The agony is all over every inch of his stiff, barely controlled expression.
“In the end, I did not give her the option,” he says. “I gave her the cure while she slept. And when she woke, she was as I was.”
It makes me sick. To think how his poor wife must have felt when she realized.
“What I did not know,” he says roughly. There’s anger in his voice. Malice. “Was that she was pregnant before I turned her.”
An actual gasp slips from my lips.
Cyrus’ hand curls around the arm of the throne. He squeezes. It bends further.
“Months later, she gave birth to a son,” he says. His voice is filled with bitterness and hatred. “And he was human. Absolutely human. We were trilled. So loving, so enthralled with this beautiful child. He grew and matured.”
The bitterness in his voice grows thicker. “But that child was born with his own mind. He saw us, his parents, understood what we were capable of. He begged me to turn him on his thirteenth birthday and my wife and I refused.”
No.
No. I don’t like the turn this story is taking. Not one bit of it.
“He tried to convince us that we could use our abilities for so much more. That we could control the world if we wished. I saw the darkness in our son, but I refused to accept that we could not train it out of him. That we couldn’t love him back from the darkness.”
I feel it. That darkness.
“Soon after he turned eighteen, he died,” Cyrus says. My heart cuts off, as abruptly as the change in the story. “A horrible, unforeseeable accident. I carried my son back to my wife. And even though we had struggled with him so much, even though we feared how his mind worked, we grieved him.”
Cyrus’ voice cracks slightly. I look up into his face. He stares down at his lap, his eyes unfocused. A mix of emotions holds him in their grasp: grief, anger, bitterness.
“But four days after we buried our son,” Cyrus continues. “He rose from the grave. With glowing red eyes, strength like my own, he clawed his way through the ground and knocked down the doors to our home.”
Ill. I feel ill. Shivers work their way down my spine.
“And from there, we lost all control,” Cyrus says. “He went his own way, the first Born vampire. Human at birth, rising from his first death as a vampire.”
Cyrus raises his head now, staring out over the dancing crowd. I look out at them as well.
They have to know this story. It’s a part of their history.
“Years passed, and I knew I must prepare. I bought loyalty and armies over centuries. Because word had been spreading that my son had managed to conceive his own children, with human women, who then died and just like him, rose from the grave. He was creating his own army of immortal heirs.”
I think of the span of time this must have taken place. First, Cyrus’ son had to grow to an eighteen-year-old man. And then go off on his own. Impregnate women. Wait for them to be born and somehow discover that they could Resurrect just like himself.
Centuries, Cyrus had said.
“We both grew in power,” Cyrus says. “With armies and loyal followers. A division formed, those who wanted to take over the world with my son. And those who knew we had to keep in secret if we did not wish to be eliminated. And eventually, it came to war.”
How many centuries ago was this? How was it kept in the shadows, so secret? How is this not known to the world?
“My son conceived seven sons, all capable of producing their own immortal Born,” Cyrus says. “He had twelve daughters, as well. In the end, two of his sons turned against him, allying with me, and three of his daughters. The rest stood with their father.”
“You won the war,” I breathe, my first words in what feels like centuries.
Cyrus nods. “It was not short. It was not clean. But in the end, I cleaved my own son’s head from his shoulders, and declared the battle finished.”
My blood stops in my body, absolutely cold.
“I banished or killed my five grandsons who turned against me. But they went about the world, producing more and more offspring. They were cut off from the family. From power, for after that time, I declared myself King, so nothing like this could ever happen again.”
He looks down at his hand, and I see scars there.
“Those early years were not easy. Bloody, cold wars continued as we sorted through political systems and rules. But you see us now, today.” He looks up, lifting his chin slightly. “We are organized. We operate under a smooth system. The descendants of the Royals rule the Houses, keeping the Born in check. Keeping sure our kind stay hidden.”
I can hardly breathe. It’s all so much. So big.
So incredible. So tragic.
But also beautiful.
“What about your wife?” I ask. He stiffens, but doesn’t look toward me. “You said you made her like yourself. What happened to her?”
He pauses. And I can’t pinpoint his reaction. “She died,” he says simply.
And suddenly he rises from his throne. He steps forward into the crowd. He extends a hand to a woman, bowing, and then he pulls her into a dance.
It’s whiplash. The tale cut too short, too quick. I need a better resolution than the one he just gave.
Slowly, Edmond walks over, pinning me with his dark eyes. He stops just in front of me, and holds out a hand.
“There might not have been only one victor in the end,” he says. “But I will still take that prize and ask for a dance.”
I look at him warily. He certainly didn’t look too pleased with me after I stopped the dance, and then again during the gladiator fights. I’m not sure if I can trust him right now.
But I’m no coward.
I take his hand and follow him out onto the floor. He places a hand on my back and leads me into the steps.
“I don’t think I understand y
ou, Logan,” he says. “You’re hard. There’s a bitterness in your eyes. You possess your own brand of cruelty and little tolerance.” He twirls me under his arm before pulling me back. “But I know the reasons you’ve done it. And they’re surprisingly tender, considering they are for a man whose cruelty and demands know no equal.”
“I don’t think it matters that you don’t understand me,” I say as he dips me. “I’ll be leaving soon and you’ll likely never see me again.”
“Oh, I very much doubt that,” he says as he lifts me once more. “There’s certainly something special about you. If there weren’t, the King wouldn’t be looking at you like that.”
And my eyes suddenly flick up, searching the room.
I instantly find him. Cyrus watches me over the shoulder of the woman he dances with. He’s intense. Focused. His lips are sealed shut tightly.
“You all know what he wants from me, don’t you?” I say as Edmond twirls me away, and my view of Cyrus is broken.
“The entire world of vampires, Born and Royal alike, know what he wants,” he says. “But we also understand that it is not our place to tell the tale.”
The music crescendos. His hands go to my waist and he lifts me. I rise through the air, feeling utterly weightless in his strong hands.
His eyes dare me to ask. To demand that he tells me what it is they’re all waiting to see in me.
So, I won’t.
I can be a petulant little beast when I want.
“A few weeks ago, at my work,” I say, changing the subject, “there was a woman who had been ripped apart. And then another had been killed soon after her. The man I watched you kill in that alley. He was a vampire. He was the one who killed them, wasn’t he?”
Edmond smiles and guides me through the steps. “Yes. He was an associate of our House years back. He was always a little…violent. But after he parted ways with us, his tendencies grew more sinister. We’d been tracking him for four weeks when we finally caught up with him in your town.”
I shiver. How many deaths are written off as animal attacks, or the work of some insidious human, when really, it was vampires?
And I’m destined to be one of them soon.
“So, if you’re not who the King hopes you are, do you think you’ll go meet your mother?” Edmond asks.