Mark of Betrayal

by A. M. Hudson

  On the bright side, at least Mike and Arthur shared one thing in common, for once; they both wanted to flatten Jason.

  The same conversations we’d had nearly every night continued down the table, except, tonight, Jason was joining in. I tuned out most of it, since it was all irrelevant; my husband was alive, so, who the father of my child should be really wasn't important.

  “These discussions have gone on long enough,” Walter said. “Fact is, we need a new king and an heir—the prophecy is of little significance at this point.”

  “Well, I’ll do it.” Jason shrugged; everyone looked at him. “Even if the queen doesn’t love me, I’ll be more than happy to step into my brother’s role.”

  “And what a powerful king you would be, too,” Old Margret said, grinning bashfully at Jason. “I’ve only heard stories of your talents.”

  He winked at her. “Even then, I bet you haven’t heard the half of it.”

  You tease!

  He looked over at me and scratched his nose, attempting to hide his laughter.

  “Yes, imagine the gifts their child—our future queen—would possess,” Walter said.

  “Remarkable,” another said.

  “I still believe she should pair with Arthur. He is, after all, a firstborn son,” a vampire woman said. “Perhaps we can achieve the prophecy child, and I am sure Arthur would make a great king.”

  “Can we stop deliberating who my best friend needs to have sex with, please?” Mike said and dropped his head into hands. “We’re at the damn dinner table, for God’s sake.”

  I reached over and pried his hand away from his hair. “It’s okay, Mike.”

  “No. It’s not.” He looked around at everyone. “Forget the prophecy child. She is not having sex with him or him!” He pointed at both Arthur and Jason.

  “I disagree. I think she should unite with her former husband’s brother. If the prophecy child was supposed to be with blood of David Knight, then surely his own DNA would suffice in place.”

  “Yes, in magic this works, too,” Grey Beard said. “With a spell based on one’s blood, a twin can offer themselves up in place.”

  “But,” the other grey beard man said. “Our runes never predicted anything which indicated your child need be blood of a firstborn, or that she would be powerful—only that there were two options; one path would lead to the end of all this, the other would see it resolved but not final.”

  A few arguments broke out across the table. I looked at Morgaine.

  “Ara, what matters is what Drake believes,” she said, obviously sensing my confusion. “He’s the one we’re running from.”

  “Okay, but, what does it matter if we have a prophecy child or not, I—”

  “Because she is the one foretold to free the Damned,” Morg said, practically singing each word out in an impatient tone.

  “I disagree.” I folded my arms, finally ready to challenge her. “You said the prophecy foretold her making a change, seeing an end to Drake, not that no one else could.”

  “I agree with Ara,” Jason said, smiling as if he’d been in our conversation the whole time. “Our queen may be the key.”

  “Shut up, Jason. You're just saying that because you want to be the one who fathers the child!” Morgaine spat.

  Jason sat back in his chair, his smug grin making him look incredibly cute. “Last I checked, prophecies foretold events that happen. If this child were meant to be with my brother, he wouldn't have died. It was always meant to be me.”

  “I agree,” said a woman. “I say they marry at once.”

  Mike spat his food out on his plate, coughing.

  “Well, for now, we’ll just see what happens.” I looked at Mike then Arthur. “Jason and I aren’t even together.”

  “Well, your majesty, you have a duty to uphold.” Margret sipped her drink, her pinkie in the air beside her goblet. “I agree with Francine; you should marry tomorrow and conceive immediately.”

  “Now, just a minute.” Mike stood up. “Ara is only nineteen. There are plenty of years for a child.”

  “That may be so—” Arthur stood too and glared at me, “—but she has a responsibility to her people. If there is a possibility of a child, she should take it.”

  “That’s it. There are to be no more discussions about this,” Mike said, slamming his hands on the table.

  “Perhaps you’d be more willing to discuss it if you were among the options,” Arthur said.

  “This has nothing to do with my feelings for Ara. She is a young girl, goddamn it, and I won't see her forced to have a child with someone she doesn't love.”

  “Well you've got no choice. Neither does she.” He pointed at me, his face red with fury. “None of us bloody well do.” His voice softened on the end and he walked briskly from the room, shaking his head.

  A wash of stunned silence rolled over the table until, one by one, everyone went back to their meals and Mike sat down.

  “Mike?”

  He looked at me, clearly biting his teeth together inside his mouth.

  “None of this matters.” I motioned around the table, referring to the topic of childbearing with other men. “Our informant will see to it.”

  He looked around, probably checking no one caught on to my not-so-cryptic remark. “That's not what this is about, Ara.”

  “Well, what are you so upset about?”

  He sat back in his chair, shaking his head, then exhaled and pushed out from the table.

  “Mike?” I called, but he kept walking.

  “Wow, this party is getting smaller and smaller,” Morgaine said.

  “What’s wrong with him, Morg?”

  “He’ll be all right,” she said. “He was kind of hoping the people wouldn't support a union with anyone else for a while.”

  “Why?”

  “Because they can make you marry and sleep with Jason if that’s who they choose.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. Why do you think Lilith hated Peter so much?”

  “Oh.” I smiled down at my empty plate. “And Mike’s worried I might end up with more than one husband?”

  “Yes.”

  “He’ll have to get over it,” Jason said, sitting in Mike’s chair.

  Morgaine’s eyes nearly popped out of her head. “You’d better hope Mike doesn't come back and see you sitting—”

  “Shut up, Morg.” He threw a pea at her from Mike’s plate. “I'm not afraid of him.”

  “Should be,” she scoffed under her breath.

  “So—” he grinned, leaning closer, “—care to sneak away from this dreary evening?”

  “No way!” Morgaine sat forward, throwing her napkin down.

  I rolled my eyes. “Morg, stay out of it.”

  “No. Mike will freak.”

  “Yeah, and Mike is about this close to getting replaced by Falcon.” I held up an imaginary tiny thing between my fingers, “He needs to chill out. He’s making me tense all the time.”

  “You wouldn’t replace him.”

  “Yes, Morg. I would.” I stood up with Jason. “I can only take so much of his over-protectiveness.”

  “It’s for a good reason, Amara.”

  “Well, Jason is officially my boyfriend, now.” I stared her down. “If my advisor says it’s a good idea, then you can damn well go along with it, Morg. Discussion closed.”

  She sat back, folding her arms, practically resting her bottom lip in her lap with its pout.

  “I've never been in the Garden of Strategy before,” I said, strolling over the squares of marble and grass, patterned like a chessboard.

  “Elysium has one just like it,” Jason said.

  “Did anyone ever hold a game here?” I nodded to the decaying ruins of stone pawns and knights, their cracks bleeding vines and moss.

  “Once.” He nodded, keeping his gaze ahead of us. We strolled along, quiet then, until we reached the end of the manor, just below his room and, above that, my windows. We both looked up, my head
turning slightly to the side to catch his thoughtful gaze.

  “What is it, Jase?”

  “Can I talk to you in private?”

  “Sure. We could go to the Garden of Lilith,” I suggested. “The guards aren’t allowed in there.”

  He looked over his shoulder to Blade, standing in the shadows, playing with his phone, not too concerned about what we were doing or saying. “I’d rather go someplace else they’re not allowed to go.”

  “Where?”

  “Up.” He grabbed my hand, grinning, and jumped into the air, taking me with him. I felt his arms wrap my waist and barely had time to hold my breath before we flew through the open window and into his room.

  “Jerk!” I shoved him when he released me to the safety of the floor.

  He just laughed and wandered over to light a lantern. The room came to life under its golden flame and he sat down on the foot of his bed, placing the lantern on his blanket box. “Come. Sit.”

  I plonked down right on his hand; he moved it, clearly finding my sudden moodiness quite amusing.

  “I'm going to get in trouble now, you know. You should have told me you were gonna do that,” I said.

  “Why? Then Blade could’ve stopped us.”

  “Exactly.” I folded my arms.

  “Don't do that.” He shoved his hand between the fold and pushed them down. “You know damn well you would have come anyway, if I asked you.”

  I smirked at his smirk. “Okay. Fine. I would. But, just tell me next time you're going to hoist me a few feet into the air.”

  “Sure thing.” He laid back on the bed, his hands behind his head.

  I could smell the strong, aromatic spice of his cologne, coming up from the heat under his shirt, and I wanted to lay on his chest and sniff him. He was just so gorgeously human.

  “You like human?” he said.

  “Stay out of my head!” I slapped his chest, letting my hand fall down on the bed right by his ribs. In truth, I didn't really want him to stay out of my head; I liked it. I missed when David used to be able to read my mind. Things had become so complicated since I had to explain my thoughts and emotions to him now.

  “So, he can’t read your mind anymore—at all?”

  I shook my head. “We were working on projecting thoughts, and I could sometimes read his mind—” when we were having sex, “—but I can’t really control it yet.”

  “Maybe I can help you.” He rubbed the side of my arm, rolling up a little. “I'm kind of an expert.”

  “It’s not really that important.”

  “Sounds like it is.”

  I shrugged one shoulder, looking around his room; it had so much personality already, like he’d gathered things from his childhood and brought them here. There was a baseball glove and ball on his drawer top, his wallet on his nightstand, a gold-trimmed picture frame with a drawing of what I assumed was Arietta, and a pair of jeans, a shirt and two socks on the floor by the foot of his bed. It seemed like he was kind of untidy, like me. I glanced over at the stack of books on the wooden table by the fireplace, sitting under his Yankees cap, but couldn't make out the titles on the spine. I wondered if he sat up late reading them, avoiding sleep—avoiding the nightmares. “Hey, Jase?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Can I ask you something?”

  “Sure. Anything.”

  “What are your nightmares about?”

  “Anything but that,” he said dismissively, looking at the bedpost.

  “Why?”

  “I…” He shut his mouth and sat quiet for a second. “I guess I don't really want to let you in to that part of myself, Ara.”

  “What part? And why?”

  “I'm not really sure how to describe it.”

  “Well, what, like, the deeper part of you—your emotional soft spot?”

  He laughed. “No, you’re already in there.”

  “Well, can you try to explain it to me?” I touched his hand. “I actually just want to help.”

  “You can't help.”

  “Why?”

  “Because unless you can cure guilt, then I just have to let this run its course.”

  “Guilt?” I closed my eyes, flashing back to that cell, where he beat me and cut me open and did things I had scars from but no memory. “David said there were things on that list, Jase, that—”

  “Ara, please?” He shut his eyes tight.

  “No. I want to know.”

  “To know what?”

  “Did you erase anything—of what you—”

  “Ara.” He held his hand up. “Don't ask me that.”

  “Why?”

  “Because, if I lie, you’ll know, and if I tell you the truth, you’ll pester me for more information until I give in. And I can't, sweet girl. I can't tell you, and I find it really hard to resist you when you bug me.”

  “So, you did erase things?”

  He shook his head to himself, angling his face to look away from me, making the shadow of his nose, down the underside of his arm, longer. My thoughts flashed to the scar I had on the base of my spine—the one Eric seemed to know something about but would never tell me, and with that, came a flashback of the horrible dream that woke me last night.

  “How did you see that?” he asked, startling me with the sudden panic in his tone.

  “See what?”

  He sat up and grabbed my face. “That dream.”

  I sat confused for a second. “Oh, the one I had last night?”

  “Yes.”

  “I…I dreamed it, I guess,” I said sarcastically.

  Jason sat back, staring into nothing.

  “What?” I waved a hand in front of his face.

  He shook it off—whatever it was, and smiled. “Arthur was a bit…uh, pissed-off tonight.”

  I laughed, letting him slink away to the land of dark secrets concealed for another day. “Yeah. What was with him?”

  A few seconds of silence passed. “I've never seen him behave like that, you know?”

  “Really?”

  “Mm.” He rolled onto his side, softly tracing a strand of hair that fell down my back. “I don't know what you said to him yesterday, Ara, but one thing I do know is that what you saw tonight wasn’t anger, it was heartbreak.”

  “Don't say that, Jase.” I sighed. “I feel really bad as is.”

  “Don't. He’s a grown man. He’ll get over it.”

  “I don't know if he will.” I shook my head. “I told him it’d make me sick to have sex with him.”

  “Ouch.”

  “I know. I…I didn’t mean it to sound so nasty.”

  “Mm, well, I wouldn’t worry. For the sake of whatever his plan is, he’ll have to force himself to get over it.” He moved forward and lifted my arm, sliding under it so his head rested in my lap. “If you think he’s gonna drop this child thing just ‘cause I'm here, you're kidding yourself.”

  I gently ground my teeth together. “Well, I better hurry and fall pregnant then.”

  “You need my brother here for that,” he said, inching away from me as though I was going to jump on him and steal his seed.

  “Ha-ha. Jerk.” I poked his upper arm. “I know. But, can you talk to him for me—to David? I can't fall pregnant if he never comes to see me.”

  “Yeah.” He smiled softly, his beautiful fangs showing under those perfect dark lips. “I’ll talk to him. I’ll threaten to impregnate you myself if he doesn't.”

  “Don't do that. He might think you're serious.”

  “Who says I'm not?”

  I rolled my eyes. “So, when are we going to announce our imaginary pregnancy?”

  “When they believe we’re in love.” His grin set my heart ablaze, those fangs showing again, and without mind for territorial boundaries, I smoothed my thumb over his lip and touched it gently to his fang.

  “You okay?” he asked, removing my hand.

  “It’s been so long now since I've been bitten. Mike won’t let anyone bite me, or feed from me. I'm like a
golden shrine.”

  “Does he let you bite?”

  “No— I have to get my vamp-immunity from approved veins, and even then, only through a pre-cut slit.”

  “Mm. Appetising.” He winced.

  “Nah. It’s okay. I feed from Eric sometimes. And Lilithians don't crave the bite like vampires do. Well—” I looked at his mouth again, “—we’re not supposed to. I miss it, though, and I miss being bitten.”

  He looked at my neck for a second too long, then let out a deep breath, focusing on the roof. “I wish we could share blood. But, before you freak out listing all the reasons we can't, just know, not only can I not do it, but I wouldn’t.”

  “Why?”

  “Because there is no way I could resist going further with you.”

  “Okay, so that's the why, what’s the can’t?”

  “I'm not immune—I don't drink Lilithian blood.”

  “Oh, right.” I whacked my own brow with the heel of my palm. “I forget you haven’t been here. Are you going to, though—be immune, I mean?”

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “I like knowing I can escape from life.”

  “Death? Why would you want death?”

  He let out a breath through his nose. “It doesn't matter. Look, it’s getting late. I’ll walk you back to your room.”

  “Jase?”

  He stood up and appeared by his open door, not looking at me. “Come on. Mike’ll go crazy if he can’t find you.”

  I laid on my belly, my forearm under my chin, one fingertip in the cool pond, watching my reflection under the backdrop of a cloudy sky. The Garden of Lilith had a kind of presence to it, as if all life, all living things gathered here to celebrate the beauty of nature. And it was peaceful. Private. Secluded.

  A frog jumped up from the water, sending ripples out in circles that grew and overlapped each other, stopping on the marble edge of the pond.

  “Are you a prince?” I asked him. “Would you like a kiss?”