Ever since we started back down the mountain, I’ve considered what his reaction might be. I left without permission. I went with his enemy’s son. I told him nothing of the plan, even in the note I posted. For all he knew, I could have been in the Day Realm, betraying him.
Will he care that we might have a solution to the sunwalker spell? Will it be enough to keep him from exiling me? From killing me?
Sebastian looks at Elliot again. His upper lip snarls, and his hands finally lose their battle. As soon as they clench into fists, I move by instinct, stepping to place myself between the two men. Elliot’s reaction is immediate. His hand leaves mine, brushing my hip as he steps forward, back to my side.
The men stare at each other for a long, impossibly silent moment. No one is breathing.
When Sebastian finally speaks, it’s not to Elliot. His attention shifts back to me, eyes wild with an unreadable emotion.
“You’re sure?” he asks.
My lips part, but I’m too stunned to speak. Of all thereactions I expected, this wasn’t one of them. I had already accepted he would be angry and likely violent. I had braced myself for the possibility I might have to hurt him to protect Elliot and myself. I would never injure him, not seriously anyway, but there was a chance he would never forgive me, all the same.
“I’m sure,” I say finally.
Maybe I imagine it, but I let myself pretend his expression softens.
“Fine,” he says. He looks back to Elliot, and now I’m certain I didn’t imagine it. One look at Elliot, and the hardness is back. The slight curl of his lip, the narrowing of his eyes. “I have killed many people, Lyrie.”
“I do not doubt that,” Elliot says, impossibly calm.
“I would not mind killing you.”
“Master—”
“I do not doubt that either,” Elliot says. Then, tipping his head slightly, he adds, “I won’t give you a reason.”
It isn’t until now that I realize how much I wanted—maybe evenneeded—this. I’m not fool enough to believe Sebastian sees me as a daughter, but a part of me will always see him as a father. Regardless of titles, he’s the only person who has ever seen the darkness in me and smiled. Even as a traumatized fifteen-year-old, I found peace in his house of horrors that I’d never felt elsewhere.
Sebastian looks away from Elliot. His green eyes pierce mine, filled with emotion I don’t know how to name.
“I do not forgive you,” he says. “Of all the things you’ve done, this is the worst.”
“Understood,” I say. “If it helps, the lead was successful. We found something big. It could make the difference?—”
“It does not,” he interrupts. He looks behind himself, at the falling sun. The sky has darkened into a deep purple. Within a few minutes, we’ll be in complete darkness—and the vampireswill be out for the night. When he faces me again, the snarl is back on his lip.
I keep my posture straight and do my best not to flinch under his unrelenting gaze. I wait for him to speak again, but he doesn’t. He turns on his heel and marches up the stairs, disappearing into the manor without looking back. If I was a fool, I’d assume he stormed all the way back to whatever he’d been doing before this.
No. Sebastian Vulce, feared vampire king, is undoubtedly lingering at the door to make sure we come inside before night officially strikes.
“That went well,” I say.
“It did?” Elliot asks, so incredulous that I smile. I realize the expression is starting to feel more comfortable, more natural.
“Yes,” I say. I take his hand, squeezing softly as I pull him toward my home. “Very well.”
Elliot doesn’t respond at first, but he stops me before I enter. His gaze flickers to the closed heavy door, then back at me.
“To be clear,” he starts, lowering his voice. I smile, knowing Sebastian can still hear him. If Elliot becomes a regular visitor here, and I hope he does, he’ll have a lot to learn. “You’re telling me he couldsmellthat we’re together.”
“More specifically, that you fucked me,” I say. When Elliot’s eyes widen, I grin. “Your scent is on me,insideme, and probably?—”
The door swings open, and if Elliot’s expression was comically horrified before, it’s fully terrified now. He grabs my hand again, tugging me slightly behind him, squaring his shoulders. He’s taller than Sebastian, but he hardly looks intimidating.
“That is enough,” Sebastian growls. “Get inside. Both of you.”
I’m still smiling, but it falls the second I realize how empty the entryway is. Usually, at this time of night, the main level ofthe manor is full of bloodthirsty vampires, rabid for a night of hunting and partying. Instead, there are only five vampires here, and they’re the same ones I see at every clan meeting.
