Chapter 20: Verchiel - Never-Ending Question, Part 5

Fifteen Years Later

***

Verchiel walked through the door of their latest den, to find the front room empty. He paused and sniffed. He could smell Kateesha, deeper in the house. An image flashed through his mind of her sprawled across the bed, her dark skin contrasted against the white sheets; a lovely surprise for his homecoming.

Not that he'd been gone long. A trip to the market had taken an hour, perhaps, but the night was still young. He'd been lucky, and the jeweler had stayed open late, just for him.

He held his purchase up, admiring the way the candlelight danced on the delicate golden chain. The jewel that hung from it was heavy and red, like the blood they drank each night; sometimes a quick snack and sometimes a reveling feast they nearly bathed in. The thought of such nights tightened both his chest and his groin. He hoped tonight might be one of those. Perhaps he should have brought the shopkeeper home as well. A pretty thing, she was the kind of meal Kateesha would enjoy.

Playing with their food was one of her favorite things. She would strip them bare, touch them, tease them, then, at the height of ecstasy, drink them dry. She was happy to entertain both men and women, but Verchiel preferred her to enjoy the latter. Seeing another man touching her, kissing her, fondling her

When he'd confessed his dark jealousy, Kateesha had laughed. "They're only humans, my pale angel. They mean nothing except a moment's diversion. Do I not share such with you? It isn't as if I take my pleasure and leave you wanting." She'd traced a long nailed hand down his naked chest, stopping below his bellybutton. "You are right there with me, enjoying them, just as I am enjoying them."

He'd let it go because what else was there to say? She was right, yet at the same time

With a sigh he lowered the necklace. He had seen into her thoughts enough to know that he wasn't her true love. To her credit, it wasn't something she tried to hide from him. Never did she play coy, or pretend that things were any other way than what they were, that there would ever be any more than this.

Yet, still a small part of himself hoped that if he did just a little more, said just the right thing, acted the part, maybe she would fall in love with him one day. He only needed the patience to wait.

As she was waiting for him, right now.

Stifling a grin, he headed back through the rooms, to the bedchamber. The door was open a crack, so he pushed it the rest of the way, a sexy remark on his lips. The thought hung there, stuck by disappointment. She was not in bed, but seated on a stool, her back to him.

He stepped into the room, but she didn't turn around, didn't greet him. He took another step, then another. When still nothing came, he closed the space between them to see a piece of parchment clutched in her hands.

"I'm back from my errand." He dipped to press a kiss to the back of her neck, and glanced over the paper. It was a language he didn't know Latin, perhaps? What new scholarly quest had she undertaken?

She drew a sharp, excited breath, then jolted, as if suddenly aware of him. "Verchiel! Sweetling, you've returned."

"Yes, I have. So kind of you to notice." He gave her a teasing wink as she turned toward him. Her bright red dress hugged her body, and would match his gift perfectly. "Guess where I have been?"

She motioned him to silence as she swept to her feet. "There is no time for such things. I must pack."

"Pack?" Verchiel glanced around the room. Clothing and underthings were strewn in heaps, and her jewelry overflowed a box on the dressing table, spread out in a tangled heap. Perfume bottles littered the vanity, shoes lay in odd places, and the wardrobe hung open to reveal badly stacked hat boxes. "It will take a week, Sweet One."

"Nay, for I shall leave most of it behind." She was already at the jewelry box, tugging pieces free. "How much of this will I need?"

"It's hard to say without knowing where we're going." He moved to catch her busy hands. "What's happened? Has someone discovered us?" How many mad dashes had they made in the middle of the night, often leaving behind everything they had amassed? How many times had some human or another raised the alarm on them, called them monsters or demons, threatened to destroy them? "We've been careful here," he added. There'd been no blood orgies, as she called them, no bodies left in the open, no witnesses.

Or had there?

"Yes, we have been careful." She tugged her hands free. This close to her, he could see the excitement dancing in her eyes, see the way her lips twitched, as if aching to smile. "You have been well behaved, sweetling."

"If we're not in a mad dash for our lives, why must we leave abruptly?"

When she didn't answer, he stepped away to scoop the parchment up. A wax seal was broken. Of the long slanting writing there was only one part that meant anything to him, and that was the signature at the bottom.

Malick.

"Your father has found us." Verchiel dropped the paper, then moved to put his hands on her shoulders. "It will be all right. I know you owe him what you've termed a blood debt, but he cannot force you to servitude. We will escape him, then-"

Kateesha brushed his hands away impatiently. "There is no escaping my father this time, sweetling."

Verchiel's stomach tightened, no longer with desire, but fear. He'd heard tales of Malick, nightmare stories of his power, his rage, his twisted sense of entitlement. In her darker moments, Kateesha had warned this day might come, that Malick might seek her out to finish paying her blood debt.

"We were his slaves, his soldiers," she'd explained to Verchiel once. "He wielded Jorick and I like his personal army, an offering to the Kugsankal, the council of immortals who struggle to rule all of our kind. He fawns over them and pretends to do their bidding, but in his heart burns the desire to overthrow them and take power himself, to rule the world. No doubt he planned Jorick and I for such deeds, so, should they go awry, we would take the punishment and not him. I will not play his puppet."

Yet, despite those strong words, there she was, ready to surrender.