Page 157 of Vampire's Choice
“Shocker,” Gideon said. “Maybe we can bring them a case of toothpaste. And soap.”
“They won’t be needing it,” Mason promised.
As Lyssa moved for the door, the others fell in behind her. Jacob, at her shoulder, followed by his brother, Daegan, Lord Mason and Maddock. Mason paused next to Jessica, gripped her hand and brought her close. Ruth heard the rumble of his voice. “I will bring her back, habiba.”
“Bring both of you back.” Jessica’s delicate face was strained but held a fierceness that matched her next words. “I wish I could take down those bastards with you.”
“They are the ones who will have to watch their backs.” Squeezing her hip, he looked toward Ruth. Paused. Ruth braced herself. Just go. Please just go.
“It’s said a certain type of memory spell can’t hold once its owner is dead,” he told her. “Or a certain amount of time has passed. When I return, I hope to have my memory back, so I can share better things with you. It feels...important.”
Ruth fought off the ache in her throat to respond. “Come back safely, my lord, with Kane and Farida. That’s what’s important. The rest…we’ll deal with the rest later.”
“Yes.” Mason looked back down at Jessica, pressed a kiss to her mouth, his hands cupping her skull, fingers in her hair. They touched foreheads, eyes briefly closed, then he released her and turned, striding away. Anwyn gripped Jessica’s hand as Jessica watched his broad shoulders. Her face was pale, her composure holding by a thread.
Sometimes waiting was the hardest thing to endure.
Merc touched Ruth’s face, his arm around her, a wing folded over her back. He’d gotten pretty touchy-feely of late, her angel incubus. She was okay with that. She desperately needed it. She drew on that energy, the strength of his body, and his thoughts.
You are strong, Ruth. So very strong. You hold fast, and when I come back, when the children are safe, I will take you back to the island to grieve. Until then, put it away.
He made it an order, made it a command she could hear vibrating through every muscle, every nerve. He knew she needed that order to reinforce her sense of self, to keep her from falling apart.
You will need your wits about you in this group, he reminded her.
That part she knew. No matter their sympathy for her grief, vampires respected strength above all else. She would be strong. She would be so fucking strong, like her parents were.
Had been.
Merc tipped up her chin and kissed her, a heated brand that jolted her. When he drew back and her eyes were open, he met them with one purpose. “Tell me you will do as I’ve said.”
“I will. Just like I’ll kick your ass later for trying to order me around.”
He leaned in and moved his lips against her ear, even though the words came through her mind. I will use a belt to beat your pretty ass for trying. Gundar has some nice thick ones. I will borrow one from his closet.
The sexual ripple wasn’t much against the other emotions she was feeling, but it reinforced what he’d said. Put it away for now. Wait until she could let it all loose, give it all to him, and figure out how to survive a pain too unbearable to contemplate.
She had her own directive for him. Merc? Let the Trads think you’re an incubus. Vampires have really strong libidos. It may muddle them. And not knowing about your angel side gives you an advantage.
That was based on the hope that Asva hadn’t revealed the identity of the “Truth Vessel” before dying. But if it couldn’t be used as an advantage, Merc would adapt.
His thumb passed over her lips, his eyes very close. So close they chilled her, because they were more pitiless than Lady Lyssa’s.
Remember I said I learned how to make it painless? I’ve never forgotten how to do it the other way. Make sexual pleasure the most agonizing thing someone has experienced. Purposefully crack open that subconscious layer, let them understand, at every level, their life is slowly leaving them, and there’s not a fucking thing they can do except watch me rip it away.
Her savage instincts responded in kind. She embraced the surge of bloodlust, the desire to take life and cause suffering. Her nails dug into his biceps. Good. If you can make it hurt, do. But mostly, just make them dead. So I know they’re no longer in this world.
There won’t be enough left of their souls to cross the Veil. That is the gift I will give my vampire.
After the rescue team departed, the rest of the Council adjourned to their usual chamber, a spacious chamber with a high ceiling, crisscrossed with beams. They were wrapped with night blooming flowers that received sunlight through the sky light during the day, while the vampires slept.
Torrence, Helga’s servant, showed Ruth to a chair set up in a quiet corner of the carpeted room. The Council seats were behind a horseshoe-shaped table, a dark polished wood with giant carved feet like a griffin’s. The chairs matched. Tapestries of past battles and historic moments in the vampire history hung behind them and on the left and right walls. In the opposite corner from Ruth, a koi pond had been constructed, the fish swimming lazily among the rocks and under the overhang of the fountain that kept up a low rush of sound.
Someone had instructed the headquarters staff to tend to her. She was brought a tea to soothe her nerves, according to the kind-eyed Inherited Servant who brought it. InhServs were the elite of the servant class, humans contracted from birth to be trained when they came of age to serve Council and the higher ranks. The arrangement was made with their families because of bonds they had with, or debts they owed to, the vampire world.
This InhServ also brought a blood-laced concoction from the Council’s secured stores of second mark blood, to fortify her strength. Inherited Servants would be solicitous of any vampire. However, Ruth wished they’d treat her with the dismissive indifference more powerful vampires usually treated a far lower ranking one. Too much kindness would break her.
She held onto Merc’s order, though, and mumbled her thanks. When her link to him vanished, it jolted her, but it meant they were in the portal. When it didn’t resurface, it told her the destination might be beyond her range. Maybe Merc could amplify it from his end, but there’d been no time to suggest trying that option.