Lysia hovered by the entrance of the inn,
unsure whether to enter or leave. Her stomach gurgled again, making her
decision for her. She had to stay. There were colourful glass bottles lining
the wall to her right and demons there were serving drinks to people who lined
a long black bar. If they had mead and other liquids then perhaps they had food
for her.
She moved deeper into the room and everyone
turned to stare at her, their eyes wide. She frowned at them all. Why did they
stare? She thought them all strange but she wasn't being rude by staring at
them. If she hadn't been so hungry, she would have asked them, or forced them
to tell her the reason.
She pushed through a group of male demons,
all of which were wearing their human forms, and they turned on her. Their
growls died as their eyes fell on her and they parted, staring as she passed.
Lysia leaned against the tacky black bar
top.
A man walked over to her, tossed a rag over
his shoulder, and smiled.
“What’ll it be?”
“I require sustenance.”
He frowned, a puzzled edge to his dark
eyes, and shook his head.
Lysia tried again. “I must eat.”
He waved his right hand and another man
joined him, a blond with pale eyes.
“Problem?” the blond said.
“Not getting this one,” the brunet responded.
The blond raked his eyes over her, his
right brow quirking. “Taking things a bit far, aren't we? You want something?”
She nodded. “I need sustenance.”
He looked at his friend and shrugged. “I
don’t understand her.”
What was there to understand? She only
wanted food.
Blood.
The two men walked away, serving others who
seemed to have no problem ordering what they desired and receiving it. She
cursed them and everyone who communicated with them with ease. While she could
understand many languages, she could write and speak only one. Without being
able to speak to the serving staff, she had no chance of getting blood.
A woman beside her cast a glance her way,
looked down at herself, and slipped off her seat and walked away, disappearing
into the heavy crowd.
Lysia sighed, perched herself on the seat,
and leaned on the bar with her forehead resting on her arms. She was warmer
inside this noisy inn but still hungry, and still tired. She needed to feed.
How?
A male stopped to her left.
She turned her head towards him and ran her
eyes up from the waist of his impeccable crisp black suit to his shoulders and
then his face. Vampire. She knew his kind and could see through his façade to
the wretched monster beneath. He smiled, his fangs on show to her and his pale
blue eyes swirling with ill intentions.
“Having trouble?” The dark-haired vampire
leaned his left elbow on the bar beside her and she sat up.
She nodded. “I need to order blood.”
He frowned at her and her heart sank. He
didn't understand her either.
“What language is that? I’m afraid I’m not
familiar with it. Can you mime what you want?” He shifted closer and she
focused hard on every word he said, listening closely so she could grasp the
words he used and use them too.
He smiled a little wider, and shifted a
little closer. His gaze drifted down to her chest and back up again.
“Mime?” He made a show of using his hands
to make shapes.
She was about to do as he asked when he
danced his fingers over her left shoulder.
A cold shiver ran over her flesh and skated
down her spine.
Lysia flicked her right wrist and hurled
him across the room, scattering the crowd and ripping a few shocked gasps from
them.
A male further along the bar looked her
way.
She froze as her eyes met his, heat pulsing
through her, a visceral throb that reached right down to her bones.
The male was handsome, but darkness clung
to him, danger that called to her and lured her to him. There was evil in him.
He would know her tongue.
He raised a glass filled with green liquid and
tipped his head, causing threads of his silver-white hair to fall and brush his
brow. He swept them back and she caught a brief glimpse of tiny horns above his
ears. Her belly flipped and heated.
“Kudos for giving Villandry hell,” he said
above the thumping music, his deep rumbling voice doing funny things to her
insides and turning her knees to rubber.
She presumed Villandry was the name of the
vampire now picking himself up off the floor across the busy room. She wasn't
sure what kudos meant though.
Lysia swallowed her trembling heart,
slipped off her seat and approached the pale-haired male with all the
confidence she could muster when he was staring at her, his jade eyes burning
into her body and setting her aflame.
Rousing strange feelings within her.
She halted beside him.
He swivelled to face her, set his drink
down on the bar but kept his left hand on the stem of the elegant glass, and
raised an eyebrow.
“Why are you naked?”
He held his right hand out and black
material appeared in it. He offered it to her.
Lysia took it and stared at it, unsure what
to do with it.
The male huffed, released his drink and
stood, managing to tower over her despite the fact she was taller than the
other females present. He moved closer to her and took the material back, but
she didn't notice it leaving her hands. The heat radiating from his big body
washed over her, cocooning her in warmth and strengthening the feelings
stirring in the pit of her belly.
She stared down at the strip of cut, hard
muscles visible between the armoured plates around his hips and his
breastplate. A warrior. Her heart accelerated. Her breathing quickened. She
dragged her eyes back up to his face and found he wasn't looking at her. He
busied himself with slipping her arms into the garment he had made for her and
she busied herself with memorising every sculpted plane of his face, from his
straight nose and strong jaw, to his firm lips as they compressed into a mulish
line.
She inched her gaze up higher, to the
stunning jade eyes that were focused on their work with an intensity that made
her ache inside with a desire to have them locked on hers with the same
ferocity.
They shifted to meet hers and then dropped,
a fascinating glimmer of shyness in them that lasted only a heartbeat before
coldness swept in to wash it away.
He tugged the material closed over her
front and tied a belt around her waist, fastening the garment in place.
“There,” he murmured, “now people will stop
looking at you funnily, and you can stop looking at me funnily.”
He stepped back, a scowl darkening his
striking eyes. She hadn't been looking at him strangely. She was merely
fascinated by him. Now that she was close to him, she could sense the depth of
the darkness within him but something else countered it, something she could
only describe as good. There was more to the male before her than she had
anticipated, and it made the pull she felt towards him grow stronger.
She looked herself over. The sleeves were
too long, concealing her hands, and the material reached her ankles. The
garment covered all of her, leaving nothing on show. Had that been his
intention?
“What do you want?” he said, bringing her
focus back to him.
She lifted her eyes to meet his. “Blood.”
He back peddled, almost falling over his
seat, a flicker of something dark crossing his handsome face. His eyes shone
pure violet.
He had eyes like hers.
And he understood her.
“Leave me alone,” he barked and snatched up
his drink with a shaky hand. He downed it, slammed the glass back onto the bar
top, and shoved it forwards, away from him. “I’m not interested.”
Lysia frowned and shrank back. Why was he
rejecting her company? He had given her something to wear, had seemed concerned
about her, and now he was pushing her away. She clutched the robe over her
chest in both hands and risked a step closer to him instead.
“I only desire blood… but I cannot order
it.”
His violet gaze darted to her and away
again. A shadow settled on his troubled features, turning them grim. He looked
down into her eyes for long seconds, stealing all of her attention, sucking it
away from the room and her surroundings.
He raised his hand and she flinched away,
anticipating the strike.
It didn't happen.
She squinted, remaining held away from him,
and looked up into his eyes.
He cocked a single pale eyebrow and waved
his left hand. The brunet male behind the bar came to them. He had been
signalling the serving staff.
Lysia grimaced.
She had much to learn about this realm.
“Blood, straight up,” the white-haired male
said.
The servant’s expression turned wary and he
shifted foot to foot. “I’m not allowed to serve you blood, remember? You made
me promise.”
He had? She canted her head, studying both
men. Why had the man asked the servant not to give him blood? Did he drink it
as she did?
The pale-haired warrior scrubbed a hand
down his face and sighed. He pressed both hands into the bar, digging his black
claws into the wood, and leaned forwards, closer to the man.
“It is not for me. It is for the woman.”
The brunet shrugged. “She has to order it
then.”
The warrior tipped his head back, screwed
his eyes shut and sighed, and she felt he was searching for calm. He drew
several slow deep breaths before opening his eyes again and fixing them back on
the barman.
“I do not think she knows how,” he said.
“I tried, but the man didn't understand
me.” That brought his gaze back to her and she shivered under the intensity of
it.
“That would be because you are speaking a
language this man doesn't know… one I don’t have a fucking clue about either
but for some godforsaken reason I can understand you.” He shoved his fingers
through his hair, clawing it back until it tugged at his forehead, smoothing
the skin, and ground his teeth. He released his head, dropped his hands to his
sides, and huffed as he leaned over, bringing his face close to hers. “Repeat
after me if you desire… blood.”
She nodded, noting that it had taken a lot
of effort for him to speak that final word. Why?
She leaned closer to him, trying to shut
out the noise of the room so she could hear every syllable that left his lips.
She watched how they moved as he spoke. How
his tongue moved. How his teeth moved.
Her focus shattered.
He had fangs.
Made for drinking blood.
Yet he had asked the man not to serve it to
him.
And she had asked him to speak of it,
something which had evidently pained him.
She stepped back and his pale eyebrows
dipped low above his now-green eyes.
“I’m sorry. I have troubled you with my
request.” She went to turn away but he caught her arm in a vice-like grip,
holding her firm. She looked down at his black fingers around her and the claws
that blended into the robe he had given her, and then up into his eyes.
He shook his head and spoke again, slower
this time. “A glass of blood, please.”
Lysia swallowed to wet her parched throat
and spoke the sounds he had made, repeating them several times over and growing
in confidence when he smiled, making her heart flutter in her chest. He nodded
and jerked his head towards the brunet behind the bar.
She turned to face him. “A glass of blood,
puh-leeese.”
“We’ll work on that last bit,” the warrior
muttered beside her, a touch of warmth in his deep voice.
The man nodded. “That’s ten quid.”
Ten quid?
What was a quid and where did she find ten
of them?
“Money,” the brunet said.
She looked down at herself. As the warrior
had clearly mentioned, and this man knew, she had come here naked. She had no
coin.
The warrior huffed and slammed two pieces
of reddish paper down on the bar top. “It’s on me. Plus my usual.”
The bartender looked displeased and Lysia
feared he wouldn't give her the blood because the warrior was paying for it,
and had requested this man not serve him blood.
She bared her fangs and growled at the
brunet, preparing to attack.
“Down girl.” The white-haired warrior
caught hold of her arm again, wrapping long fingers around it, and heat blazed
through her.
She looked across at him, her eyes wide. He
glared at the bartender.
The man heaved a sigh, swiped the money off
the bar, and walked away. A sharp spear shot through her heart and she tried to
pull away from the warrior to follow the man, afraid he wouldn't return.
The warrior’s grip on her arm tightened and
he pulled her closer, until her backside bumped against his thighs. An achy
shiver bolted through her and she spun to face him, catching the shock in his
eyes before he covered it. He had felt it too.
“He will be back with your drink and then
you can leave me alone,” he said in a gruff tone, released her and sat back on
his seat, turning his profile to her.
Lysia’s heartbeat began to climb, awareness
of the people around her creeping back in. The vampire was on his feet again
and glaring at her. Others stared her way too. Some of them not mortal. She
didn't like how they watched her, not when she was weak.
Only the warrior felt as if he wasn't a
threat to her and that he would protect her rather than seek to harm her.
She didn't want to leave his side.
The brunet returned as the warrior had
said, bringing an elegant glass of green liquid for him and one filled with
dark liquid. He set that one down in front of her and moved off to serve
another patron.
The warrior eyed her expectantly.
He wanted her to leave.
Lysia sucked down a breath for courage and
reminded herself that she was a warrior too and as powerful as any of these
beings on her best day. Today was not her best day though and it was wreaking
havoc on her courage, leaving her feeling vulnerable. She was injured,
starving, and everything around her felt so alien and unfamiliar.
Except for him.
He made her feel safe.
She made sure she had all of his attention
before she whispered, “Allow me to stay. The men here mean me harm.”
His face darkened, his jade eyes swirling
into blazing violet, and he slid his deadly gaze towards those staring at her.
She felt their eyes leave her.
“Sit,” he growled, more a command than a
request, and she obeyed.
She took the stool beside him, swivelled to
face the bar and picked up her glass. She sipped the blood, her gums itching
and fangs aching to descend. She wanted to gulp it down but it was such a small
quantity and she didn't think the warrior would buy her more.
It wasn't enough to appease her hunger. It
would only take the edge off it.
She would need more and her heart said she
knew where she wanted her next meal to come from.
Her gaze slid to the warrior, settling on
his strong neck and the pulse hammering there, powerful and steady, a beat that
called to her.
She wanted to bite him.
