Liminality: Gay Shifter Vampire Romance (Kingdom of Night Book 2)

by L. C. Davis

  “And what if I can't trust my heart anymore?” I asked quietly.

  “We haven't moved past the mopey emo vampire phase yet? Remus, you managed to convince your father and your mate to let you stake yourself for the second time in an attempt to save someone else. A vampire, no less. You've got more heart than anyone I know, lupine or otherwise.”

  I bit my lip, struggling to hold back the tears that flowed much too easily for a monster. “Thank you, Ulric,” I said, hesitating. “I mean, thank you, dad.”

  Surprise registered on his face for a moment before he hid it behind his usual sardonic demeanor. His eyes were just slightly shinier than usual, though. That he couldn't hide. “You're welcome. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to familiarize myself with an archaic tradition of magic I don't believe in.”

  I leaned in to kiss his forehead. “I'll leave you to it, then,” I said, smiling as I turned away and listened to his half-hearted grumbling as I left the room.

  16

  The next day passed uneventfully and swiftly at the same time. As much as I wanted to get the ritual over with so everyone would finally be safe, part of me was still anxious. I was doing my best not to show it, but I knew Victor could tell.

  He caught up with me in the kitchen as I was making a midday meal of toast and eggs on a whim.

  “You're eating?” Victor's tone registered surprised. I turned around and saw that his hair was still damp from the shower.

  “Another run?” I asked, matching his incredulity. The treadmill had seen more action than the shibari crane in the dungeon ever since lockdown.

  “I have to burn off the excess energy somehow,” he said, grabbing a bottle of water out of the refrigerator.

  “Are you hungry? I made plenty.”

  “No,” he said, eying the skillet. “Since when do you eat more than once a day? Not that I'm complaining.”

  “I don't know, I've just been hungry lately. Anyway, I'm hoping it'll put my stomach at ease.”

  “At ease? Remus, if you're having second thoughts --”

  “No, not at all. I just want to make sure I don't falter since the ritual is time-sensitive.”

  He didn't look convinced, but he dropped it. “I just heard back from one of Sebastian's closest friends. If anyone had heard from him, it would be Billy.”

  “No word?” I asked even though the look on his face had already given me the answer. He shook his head almost apologetically.

  “Guess we'll just have to keep waiting,” I said, dumping the eggs in the trash once I realized I had burned them in my distraction. I had lost my appetite anyway.

  “Remus,” Victor said, placing his hands on my shoulders, “he's fine. He'll come back when he's ready.”

  “You're right.” My voice hitched in my throat for some reason. Had I really been foolish enough to hold out hope that I'd actually reached him in the dream? Then again, maybe I had and he just didn't want to come back.

  “You're different,” said Victor, turning me to face him. He swept a tear from my cheek with his thumb and stared down at it in bewilderment. “You're crying.”

  “Yeah. Vampire puberty, I guess.”

  “Something's not right,” he murmured.

  I turned off the stove and pulled my arms around his neck to kiss him before he could change his mind and forbid me from participating in the ritual. “I'm fine! I'm just on a steady diet of werewolf blood and I think all of our sessions are taming my instincts.” That part was true, at least.

  “Maybe,” he said reluctantly. His expression changed suddenly like he'd just remembered something. “Have you seen Brendan today?”

  “Yeah, he's hanging out with Mav. Why?”

  “Just making sure he's alright.”

  “You mean after you drank his blood?” I asked, cocking an eyebrow.

  He sighed, pressing his hips into me until I was backed against the counter. “What happens in the dungeon stays in the dungeon, love.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Brendan already swore me to secrecy.”

  “He's a smart boy,” Victor said, smirking as he placed his hands on either side of the cabinets behind me. “I take care of my subs, you know.”

  “Brendan is a sub?”

  “He is when he's in my room,” he said casually.

  “Exactly how many of the wolves have you been in session with?” I ask, venturing the question I'd been afraid to ask for some time.

  “All of them,” he replied without hesitation. “With the exception of Sebastian, of course.”

  “Even Clarence?” I asked doubtfully.

  “On more equitable terms but yes, we've shared a few submissives during his time here. What's with that look?”

  “Victor,” I said carefully, “you're a slut.”

  He stared at me for a moment before giving the first real laugh I'd heard from him in awhile. “I guess I am. Not everyone can be as innocent as you.”

  “Innocent?” I echoed doubtfully, yelping as his knee found its way between my legs. “I wouldn't go that far, but I was pretty vanilla before I met you. That's what it's called, right?”

  “Mhm,” he murmured in acknowledgment, nuzzling my neck. His teeth claimed my flesh shortly after his lips had and a small moan escaped my lips.

  “Can you not?”

  We both turned around to find Clarence standing in the doorway, taking up most of it with his large frame. Foster was partially hidden behind him. “I know you're gonna be the alpha soon, but we make food on that counter.”

  Victor pulled away, sweeping his hair back into place. “What do you want, Clarence?”

  “The kid has something to say and he was afraid to approach you on his own,” he said, gesturing to Foster.

  The youngest wolf cowered in humiliation. Obviously he hadn't meant that part to be recited.

  “What is it, Foster?” Victor asked, taking on a surprisingly gentle tone, almost as if he was speaking to a child. Foster was young, but he wasn't that young. It seemed to work, though, because his shoulders lost some tension and he ventured out from behind Clarence just a little.

  “It's about the ritual tonight, Sir,” he said quietly, casting a nervous glance my way.

  “I can leave if you want to speak alone,” I offered.

  “No, that's okay,” Foster said quickly. “It involves you, too.”

  I listened, curious.

  “You see, uh, I had a vision last night,” he said, looking at the floor.

  Clarence rolled his eyes mildly.

  “Go on,” Victor said patiently.

  “Well, uh, Remus was in it. So was Hunter.”

  “What happened?” Victor pressed. “Did the ritual go wrong?”

  So that was the real reason why the resident atheist was suddenly so interested in the visions of a kid who was crazy at worst and overly imaginative at best. I waited in quiet fear that Foster would give Victor more reason to change his mind than my strange behavior already had.

  “No, it will work,” he said without an ounce of hesitation. “It's just that it's going to set something else in motion, I think. She has plans for them both.”

  Victor listened, his hand covering his mouth like it always did when he was deep in thought. He'd picked that up from Ulric. “And by She you mean the moon?”

  Foster nodded.

  “Well, thank you for letting us know. Is there anything else?”

  “No, that's it,” he said, clearly relieved of his burden. He sniffed the air. “Is there food?”

  “No, but I can make more,” I offered.

  “You don't need to do that,” said Victor.

  “I know, but I already got everything out and it'd be a welcome distraction,” I said, turning the stove on again. Foster and Clarence sat at the counter without protest.

  Victor sighed, following suit. “I guess I could eat.”

  As they began to talk about random events around the Lodge, the anticipation of the evening to come began to slip away. Even Clarence loosened up more than he
had in the entire time I'd known him. I started to notice how closely he looked after Foster, always making sure he had what he needed. It wasn't the same way Victor looked after me, but the lack of romance between them—at least on Clarence's end—didn't mean there was any lack of affection.

  Aside from fielding a stray question here or there, I mostly just listened to them talk while I cooked. Victor was attentive with them both, asking questions with genuine interest. They were letting their guard around him more than they had since I'd come to the Lodge.

  He was going to be a good alpha. His distance from the pack was the only thing that had ever called that into question. As hard as it was for me to swallow, maybe the pack was better off without the friction that was bound to exist as long as Victor, Sebastian and I shared a space.

  Maybe Sebastian and Victor were better off, too.

  All I knew for sure was that if it was going to be my last day on earth, I couldn't think of a better way to spend it than serving the people I loved most. My family.

  17

  Victor and I walked downstairs hand-in-hand to find that the ritual stage had already been set. Hunter was holding the red book we'd taken from Arthur's room in one hand and using it as a reference for the chalk diagram he was drawing on the hardwood floor in front of the main entrance. It looked like the rudimentary figure of a man surrounded by some sort of star polygon. In the upper right corner a sun with a weeping face shone down on the figure.

  Afraid to break his concentration, we stayed silent. Ulric wasn't there yet, and it didn't seem like anyone else had been invited. An intimate gathering, to be sure.

  He finally finished drawing and turned to face us. “Hey,” he said with a tired smile. The dark circles ringing his eyes were even heavier than they had been the night I'd met him. “Glad you could make it,” he said in that tone that made it hard to tell if he was joking or not. “Your dad will be down in a second, he's just dealing with a little problem.”

  “Is everything alright?” I asked worriedly.

  “Oh, yeah. No worries. Victor, you're staying?”

  “You need a werewolf's blood, right?” He rolled up his sleeve and showed his wrist. “I've got a lifetime supply.”

  I rolled my eyes. “You're getting worse than Ulric with the dad jokes.”

  He smiled placidly. Hunter gave a half-hearted laugh. “Thanks, but it's more powerful if the blood offering belongs to the ritual caster. Anyway, I can't ask you to do that.”

  “Why not?” he asked, frowning. “Is it that big of a deal?”

  “Yeah, blood is used because it's the ultimate correspondence for life force,” he explained. “All five elements are present in blood of all types, but vampire blood is a lot stronger than werewolf blood for magical purposes. I've got more experience dealing with this stuff, so there's more for the magic to draw from. I'm also hoping that my blood will take a bit of the heat off of Remus.”

  “Are you sure you're up for this?” I asked, concerned for him now that I was beginning to get a sense of what a toll the ritual would take. “Is it safe? For you, I mean.”

  “It'll be fine.”

  I was about to comment on his evasion when the dull sounds of arguing from upstairs grew closer. Ulric charged down the stairs a moment later with Clarence hot on his heels.

  “If you're going to let him risk his fucking life, I'm not just gonna sit in my room and wait,” Clarence growled. It was the first time I'd seen him truly angry rather than just grouchy—no, not angry. Furious.

  Ulric looked as if he'd just been through an ordeal. “If you're going to inflict your presence on us, then for God's sake keep quiet about it,” he snapped.

  “What's wrong, Clarence?” I asked, making note of the strange way Ulric and Hunter were behaving. “Is Hunter in danger?”

  “He's not just in danger, he's risking his life,” Clarence said, his chest rumbling with a growl I'd only ever heard from a wolf in its beastform. “He's not just using magic, he's using hunter magic.”

  “Wait, like his magic or like the freaky undead serial killers' magic?” I clarified.

  “The second one.”

  “Clarence, I told you to knock it off!” Hunter snarled, staggering the larger wolf. “We don't have the time and I don't have the patience for your bullshit.”

  “You're not going to have any time left at all if you do this,” said Clarence. “Did you tell them what you told me? That it's been forbidden by every other school of magic for a reason?”

  “I told you that in confidence, not so you could freak out and go tattle to everyone,” Hunter said, looking as if he was about to pounce. “This is my decision to make, not yours.”

  “Hunter, if this is too dangerous --” I began.

  “No! It's not your decision either,” he snapped. “Do you want to protect the people you love or not?”

  “Of course, but not if --”

  “This is the only way it can be done. Period. No last-minute lambs for the slaughter,” he said, regaining his composure as he turned back to Clarence. “Maybe you are my mate, maybe you're not. All I know is that if you are, you have to respect me enough to let me make my own calls or it's never going to work.”

  Clarence looked deflated. All the anger and bluster was gone. The true motivation behind his outburst had been revealed, and it was fear. “I can't just stand by and watch you risk your life.”

  “What am I risking, Clarence? Everyone I love is gone and I let it happen. Avenging their deaths is the only way I'm going to be able to live with myself, to have any kind of life with you or anyone else,” he said desperately. “This is just the beginning of what I have to do to be strong enough for that, so if you really give a damn about me you'll step aside and shut the fuck up.”

  I prepared for a massive confrontation as a million different emotions flickered across Clarence's face, but he ultimately stepped back and watched in somber silence. No one said a thing for a long time. Even Ulric was silent.

  “Okay,” Hunter said, closing his book and placing it on top of another one that I assumed was from Ulric's study. “So, the drawing on the floor is the sigil of the hunters. The ritual calls for something from a vampire, a werewolf, and a hunter, hence the two blood offerings. As you can tell, we don't exactly have any way to get hunter blood, but their sigil should be a good enough substitute as long as I got it exactly right.”

  “What if you didn't?” asked Victor. “If this goes wrong, is there any chance of you or Remus getting hurt?”

  “The risk to Remus is minimal,” he said. “A sacrifice is basically just a fancy correspondence. Most of the energy for the ritual is being drawn from me.”

  Ulric stepped forward. “Like I told you before, Hunter, there's no reason to feel pressured to do this. We can find another way.”

  “There is no other way,” he said. “If you don't let me perform the ritual, I'm just going to move on to the next pack. You're not saving me.”

  Ulric sighed. “Very well, then. What can we do to help?”

  “For starters, once the ritual begins you can make sure that there are no distractions,” he said. “This kind of magic takes a lot of focus. If anyone hesitates or panics once things start getting weird, I'm the one in danger. Once a connection is made, breaking loose before the end of the ritual poses a few different risks to me.”

  “Such as?” Victor asked. He'd been listening intently the entire time, but I could tell the wheels were turning in his mind. I hoped he wasn't rethinking his decision to allow me to be used as the sacrifice. Even if I wanted to use another vampire, it was too late now to find an alternate.

  “I could go insane, get possessed by a noncorporeal supernatural or—and this is purely theoretical—die,” he added for Clarence's benefit.

  “You living to see another day is theoretical, too,” Clarence muttered.

  “It's much more likely that I'll just go into my beastform,” Hunter said, ignoring him. “On the off chance I'm unfortunate enough to shift an
d get possessed, I need someone ready to subdue me—not him,” he said pointedly, shooting a look at Clarence.

  “You have my word,” said Ulric.

  “Ours too,” Victor and I said in unison.

  Clarence gave a chuff of acknowledgment but he wouldn't look at any of us.

  “Okay, then. Any more questions before we get started?” asked Hunter.

  “Just one,” I said. “You mentioned a connection. Who are you connecting to, exactly?”

  “If all goes well? The moon,” he said, kneeling on the floor to pull out a pile of black candles from his backpack. He started placing them around the hunters' sigil at five points. He turned away from us and I could hear him muttering something intently under his breath.

  “Oh, hell,” Victor whispered.

  I squeezed his arm. “Just give him the benefit of the doubt.”

  “I'm trying, but the moon, Remus? We may as well be letting Foster draw squiggles circles on our floor.”

  “Hunter is talented, plenty of other wolves have vouched for his work,” I reminded him. “Even Sebastian.”

  “When did you have the chance to talk to him about that?”

  “It's not important,” I said, kicking myself for referencing the dream. “Besides, believing in the Moon isn't that crazy.”

  He snorted. “Name one person who's actually heard anything from the Great Lady in the last hundred years.”

  I hesitated for a moment before I replied, “Me.”

  He looked down at me and his smile faded when he realized I wasn't kidding. “Seriously? When?”

  I shrugged. “In the field, right before you found me. When I thought I was going to die, I just felt Her presence, I guess. I called to Her and then you showed up. Maybe I was just delirious from fear. Maybe I'm just crazy, period. All I know is I had never felt that kind of warmth and peace before, and I haven't felt it again since I became a vampire.”