by Shania Tyler
Kelly’s throat seized and then she screamed.
Mason turned Kelly around, trying to get her to calm down, but her body shook and her screams turned her face red. Her small hands fisted, and she threw herself into his arms. Mason raced her up the stairs and into her room, keeping her cradled in his grip.
He’d planned to tell her the truth, but not this way. Never this way. He’d wanted to wait until she’d understood his language and then had planned to slowly ease her into the nature of magic. He understood her world and knew that while there were those who were fully aware of other worlds, most humans did not believe.
With the door closed, her screams stopped, and then she froze and looked at him. Choking, she said, “Oh god, are you one of them, too?”
Mason must have worn a certain expression on his face, because she backed away from him with her hands up and a look of pure fear on her face.
“Oh god!” she shouted. “Don’t come near me.” She tripped on the rug and landed on her rear.
Mason moved to help her, but her arm went up even more and the startled look in her eyes struck him right in the chest.
“Stay away.”
“Shit.” He had to fix this.
Kelly turned to look around her for a weapon, but finding nothing, looked toward Mason and felt her lungs close. He’d gotten down on his knees and was crawling toward her, so she crab walked away. “Stop,” she shouted.
“Kelly.” The look in his eyes was not predatory, but that didn’t change the fact that she knew who and what he was. She wanted him far, far away from her. She groaned when she realized that the first guy she’d been attracted to since breaking up with Ethan was a vampire. She had to be dreaming again. “Damn, why won’t I wake up?” Her back hit the wall, and she quickly grabbed up her knees and buried her face in her lap, bringing her arms up to rest on her knees.
A memory from last year returned to her. Her friend Amity had claimed she’d thought their former school president was a vampire. Could it have been true?
The sound of her breathing was loud and warm in the small space where her face rested. She heard nothing besides the crackling of the fire and the sound of crickets from the window overhead. After a while of silence, she figured that he’d left, and lifted her head.
Mason sat on the floor a few feet away from her. One knee was propped up while the other was bent. A hand combed through his dark hair, his elbow resting on the high knee. The fingers in his hair looked strong and made high contrast between his pale skin and his dark hair. His other hand lay limp over his knee and his head was bent.
He rested this way for a long time, and she wondered what he was thinking.
Then he looked up, pushing his hair back, and those green eyes that had first captured her seemed to do it all over again. He was so handsome and now she understood the longing she felt for him. She’d read enough books to get it.
“You hypnotized me,” she whispered.
He said nothing for a moment, but then he dropped his knee, crossed his legs, and said, “Only once.”
She made a moue of distaste. “When we first met. Inside the administrative building. It’s why I like you.”
A confused look came over his face, and he shook his head. “No, only to calm you down when we were at the president’s house.”
She thought about that moment, remembering it clearly now. They’d been chased by a shadow with a dark face. He’d asked her to go with him, but she’d frozen, not believing anything to be real. It was still hard to accept it. “So, you only hypnotized me once?”
“You like me?” he asked.
Kelly tightened her hold on her legs. She was so not answering that question. Not until he answered hers. “Are you a vampire?”
He looked up at the ceiling, Kelly gazed at his long neck. He let out a sigh and looked at her. “Yes.”
She froze again.
“I’m not going to hurt you.”
“But—but you could.”
“I think it’s fair to say that we could both hurt others,” he countered with a cocked brow. “Humans are not known to always follow their ‘turn the other cheek’ teachings.”
Kelly’s cheeks stung at that, but then she said, “Yes, but only one of us could drink the other to death.”
He said nothing to this.
She frowned and whispered, “Oh god, you can actually do that?”
“I’d have to be very hungry.” He began to play with the ring around his middle finger.
She studied him and tried to think of a way to get them to switch positions so she could leave the room. She silently prayed that morning would come quickly so that he would have to go hide from the sun. “Are you hungry now?” she asked.
He shook his head. “No, I ate an hour ago.”
She frowned. “From whom?” Then she wondered why that mattered.
He looked up with drawn brows. “She gave freely to me.” I bet she did. She bet women gave him a lot of things “freely." He thought she was accusing him of forcing his victim to give up her blood; in reality, she was upset that he’d fed from someone else. She allowed him to go on with his assumption.
Kelly touched her own neck and asked, “Do you drink from her—”
“Only her wrist at the table.”
Such manners.
Kelly’s lips thinned. “And when you aren’t at the table?”
“We can drink from wherever we want, so long as the partner is willing.”
“You drink from men, too?”
His eyes became hooded and he said, “No, only women.” After a heartbeat, he asked in a low whisper, “Would you like to know all the places on your body I could drink from?”
She tightened her legs, but the aching had already begun at his words. She didn’t like where this conversation was going and needed to get her thoughts back on track. She needed to get out of here alive. “Where am I?”
“Can I come closer?”
“No.”
He sighed, rolled his eyes, and then leaned back against the wall. “Morwen.”
“Really?” She’d grown up in Morwen and couldn’t remember ever seeing homes of this size. This house would have taken up at least a block in her city.
“Not your Morwen, my Morwen.” She could hear his annoyance.
“Okay . . . what does that mean?” She looked toward her nightstand and noticed the candlestick. It was small but made of metal. Perhaps . . .
He mumbled something.
“What?”
He mumbled again, only louder, and Kelly pursed her mouth. He was purposefully making her angry.
She dropped her knees and leaned toward him. “I can’t hear you.”
He leaned up on his elbows and a smirk appeared on his lips when he said, “You should come closer then.” This vampire was getting sexier by the minute.
Mason watched Kelly press her lips together. She’d calmed down from her earlier fear, so now all he needed to get her to do was accept her reality. He was a vampire. She was an elf. That’s just the way things were.
“I’m not going anywhere near you,” she said in a superior voice. Her nose rose as if considering a disagreeable scene. Too bad he already knew she liked him. She’d let that one slip, and he was not going to let it go. He wondered what her boyfriend would say if he knew.
“But don’t you want answers?” he asked, trying to tempt her away from the wall and toward him. The quicker she accepted her situation, the faster everything else would fall into place. He needed her to go to Talon Island with him willingly or they’d never make it. “Don’t you want to know about the elves?” Honestly, he couldn’t tell her much about her elf side except for the basics. Usually one could smell what bloodline a gifted elf was from, and now that his mind was no longer clouded by the pava situation, he could definitely pick up whatever Maurice had smelled.
Kelly was powerful, and she didn’t even know it. It was why he’d gone for her. The most powerful elves could live under the protection of th
e gods if they made it to Talon Island, so delivering her would mean good things for him.
But Maurice had insinuated the fact that Kelly was powerful, and thus drinking from her would make any vampire stronger. Kelly’s powers were unlocked, and he had no idea how she’d done it. He wondered what gifts she might possess. There were eight to test for, but this would all come later.
For now, he had to keep her compliant and had to—
“I want answers, but I need to get back to the dorm,” she said. “I have a big test tomorrow, so if you don’t mind showing me the way, that would be great. We could totally meet up tomorrow afternoon or something . . . well, I mean, tomorrow night, since you’re a vampire and all. Then you can tell me what’s going on. All right?” She stared at him, waiting for him to do something.
“Hmmm.” He didn’t know how to break the news to her.
“Hmmm?” she asked, leaning forward. “That doesn’t sound good.”
“It’s not.”
“And why is that?”
“Tomorrow already passed.”
Her lips fell apart. “Please tell me you’re lying.”
“I’m not.”
“How long have I been here?”
He looked away for a moment as he counted. “Three days?”
“Three days!” She shot up from the floor. “Oh, my god, my parents are going to kill me if I fail. I’ll kill me if I fail. I’m so close.” She started past him toward the door. “I need to apologize to my professors and see if I can take a makeup exam.”
When she passed, Mason stood. Thinking quickly, he pulled the first lie he could think of out of his butt. “Kelly, none of that matters anymore.” Well, at least it didn’t matter to him.
She turned around with wide eyes. “Doesn’t matter? Do you know how much money has been spent for me to—”
He cringed before saying, “But none of that is your destiny.”
Kelly tilted her head. “What?”
“Your destiny.” And even as he said it, it made him sick. “Your parents? They aren’t your parents. You’re an elf, Kelly, and you’re here to save the world.” Gods, he had no idea how he managed to say all of that without falling down into a fit of laughter, but he’d managed.
Kelly, however, did laugh. “Save the world? Are you kidding me? I’m a history major. I want nothing to do with the future.” And she put her hands up in surrender.
The reply surprised him, because it had been much like his own when he’d been told of his own destiny. “But it’s true,” he told her, without guilt or shame. “An entire race rests in your hands. It’s why I came for you. It’s why I brought you here.”
Kelly stared into his eyes, still smiling from her laugh earlier, but slowly her smile faded away and she said, “Are you serious?”
No. “Yeah.” And after a moment, he added, “We need you.” And he hoped his face looked sincere.
Kelly studied that Boy Scout, honest-hand-to-god, twenty-four-karat, cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-die face and said, “You’re so full of shit.”
Mason’s face fell and he said, “Let me show you.”
Kelly was already shaking her head and looking around the room. “Where are my clothes?”
He grabbed her hands then and it was the first time they’d touched since the stairs. She actually jerked in panic, but she calmed down when his thumbs stroked the back of her hands. “Give me one hour to prove it.”
Kelly looked up into his eyes, and let out a noise that was both annoyance and defeat. “Ugh. Fine. One hour. Sixty minutes and not a moment more.”
He grinned. “Thank you.” He then kissed her hands slowly and sinfully, his lips pressing gently against her palms and fingers.
Kelly’s toes curled and she had to stop herself from letting out a purr. She yanked her hands away. “Fifty-nine minutes and counting.”
* * *
6
CHAPTER
SIX
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* * *
Are you all right?
* * *
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Kelly pushed the mansion’s front doors open and looked around in the torch lights until her eyes caught Mason’s. He stood, leaning over the railing, but when he heard the doors open, he turned and the look he gave her . . . It was the one a guy gave when a beautiful woman entered his sight.
She looked down at the dress she’d been given to wear. It was white silk and felt more like drapes than clothes. The dress was cut low both in the front and in the back, and had been secured with a gold chain around the waist. The skirt flowed freely to her feet and a pair of sandals peeked out underneath the billowing dress. It reminded her of the statues of the Roman goddesses.
However, she didn’t recognize the symbol on the golden medallion that had been pinned onto her chest. A pair of open hands that held nothing but a winding road, which seemed to travel through them. “What does this mean?” she asked Mason, pointing to the medallion. When she raised her eyes back to his, she was surprised to find him glaring at the pin. “You don’t like it?”
“It’s necessary,” he told her.
“What does it mean?”
With a scowl he said, “It’s from the House of Heron. Heron is the God of Pathfinders and Vanishers. The hands mean he’s made something go away, but the road leads to things searched for. Those who are of Heron’s bloodline are blessed with his gifts.”
She found that interesting. “And does this imply that I am of the Heron bloodline?”
Mason crossed his arms and smirked. Their little hour of show and tell had begun. “I don’t know. Elves from this house find things.”
She put her hands on her hips. “I’d rather make things disappear.” Or someone. Mainly him.
Mason laughed and turned his head away. The wind picked at his hair, and his cheekbones became more pronounced. “It doesn’t work that way.”
“Oh?” she asked. That sucked.
He chuckled and said, “You are elf, which means you can only find things if pathfinding is your ability. If you were vampire, then you could make things disappear. Balance. Everyone has a purpose.”
She smiled. “That’s kind of cool.”
He chuckled again and took her hand. “Come on. Let me show you my Morwen.”
They started down a long, stone stairway and Kelly noticed for the first time that they were high in the mountains, her first clue that she was not in Connecticut anymore. Torches dotted the various hills and slopes and in the distance was her first clue that she was not in Connecticut anymore. Heck, she wasn’t on the East Coast of the US anymore.
The stairway appeared endless and held a row of lit torches on either side for guidance; down below she saw a small city with more lights. Even high in the mountains, she could hear music floating on the wind and in another direction she heard the sound of metal on metal. “What is that?”
“What?”
“That knocking sound.”
“The miners,” he told her. “Morwen holds most of the diamonds of Asea.”
“Asea?”
In the light of the torches, their eyes found one another again. “That’s the name of this planet; she is also the mother of all living things.”
“Hmm,” Kelly said, turning back toward the never-ending staircase. She was glad they were walking down, but she didn’t know if she’d have the strength to get all the way back up to the house. Was there an elevator around here? She hadn’t noticed any electricity. There had only been candles. “Do you have electricity?” she asked. She could see small houses that looked to have been carved out of the stone. They were adorable.
“No,” he told her. “Silver is the best conductor of electricity in and thankfully, there is not much of it to be found in Asea.”
Cute and smart. She liked that. “Thankfully?” she asked.
“I’m a vampire. We don’t do well with silver.”
“Hmm.”
He laughed. “You don’t believe me.�
� His fingers tightened on hers, and the urge to lean her head against his arm grew.
She asked another question to distract herself. “Do you only drink blood?”
“And spirits.”
“No food?”
“No.”
Interesting. “Tell me more about the powers. What else can I try?”
He was silent for a moment and then said, “My bloodline is Seocan. He is the God of Illumination and Shadow.”
“Like the one that chased us on campus?”
He seemed to contemplate this for a moment and then said, “Perhaps.”
“You’re not sure?”
“No one is,” he told her. “I was told that in the beginning of time, vampires could walk in the light, but that was long ago.”
“So,” she asked slowly. “The elves bring the light, and the vampires create the shadows?”
He nodded.
“You want me to try to make light?”
“No,” he quickly said. “Vampires cannot be in the sun.”
“Ooh, why?” She gasped and paused with her mouth slightly parted. “Do you sparkle?” The look on her face was that of a woman given an expensive piece of jewelry.
He rolled his eyes and said, “No, we die.”
“Oh.” The disappointment was clear.
“Burnt to a crisp.”
She shuddered. “Okay.” The word dragged from her lips. “What else is there?”
“There is Melody and Cacophony. Healing and—”
“Destruction?” she guessed.
He shook his head and said, “Decay,” he corrected.
Her nose wrinkled.
He smiled. “Foresight and—”
“Hindsight!” she shouted, coming to stand on her toes with a finger pointed in the air. Her excitement was the most gorgeous thing he’d seen in years. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d laughed so much.
“Yes,” he told her and he stroked her cheek. “Hindsight.”
Her face glowed in the light of the fires, and he was witness again to the reason why men fell for their pavas so easily. Kelly tested and tempted him at the same time. Not even Cecina had held him this captivated. Cecina had been very gentle and soft-spoken. Until the day he found out she was working for the Rebellion, she’d been the perfect candidate for wife of the colester of Traso. Traso was Mason’s homeland, and one of the largest cities in the middle lands and the supplier of most of Asea’s fruits. It held jungles and hot springs. Before he’d betrayed his race to help free the slaves, there had been talk of him becoming the colester there.
