Page 4 of Nightshade

But he’d never crossed an ocean, and there was much in the new world that was novel, simply nothing that was entirely so.

I’d freed myself with the command to provide him a unique culinary experience, and that impulse still pulsed in the back of my mind. One day, I’d return to him, and perhaps I’d be the novelty.

He’d consume a vampire who’d defied him for centuries. I had no doubt I was the first to survive this long.

In the meanwhile, I was trapped here, and whatever spells the witches had cast on these bars also kept my maker from seeking me out. In an oblique way, I was grateful to them. The witches were, by comparison, rather kind. I liked the sound of their laughter.

They clearly had motivations that drove them beyond simply increasing my misery.

Occasionally they brought me some game animal from the forests nearby.

And they felt nice. Their bodies were warm and soft, like they’d never fought or struggled to survive. They were eager for what I could give them—that I could awaken them, yes, but also the edge of danger from letting me drag my lips across their pretty necks.

I’d known decades of freedom in the American colonies, in the early days of the nation where war and ever-shifting goals and organization made accounting for people difficult.

It was when I’d taken off toward the west during the gold rush that I’d stumbled upon the witches and they’d taken me.

Before that, my time in the Americas had been grand. The way that white Americans treated a man with golden-brown skin and dark eyes made it all too easy to justify sinking my teeth into any number of them. I’d never eaten so well.

It was a land of promise and plenty, and I had let my guard down and landed myself in a cage—kept, but safe. My situation could have been worse.

It could have been better, too, and the tingling agitation that danced over my skin seemed to announce my guest’s arrival before he’d even slipped down the creaky wooden stairs.

It was the high witch’s pretty son, Daire. There were women and men both in this coven, but something about him stood out to me. Maybe it was simply that he was the progeny of my captor. I wanted to ruin him, to turn his pretty coppery waves dark and sopping with his life’s blood.

Maybe it was the desperate hunger in his eyes. He was always looking for something, but no matter how many times I’d offered it, he never acquiesced.

He was one of very few who held himself back.

“Hello there,” I drawled, pressing my cheekbone against the iron and letting my tongue slip tantalizingly between my lips. No, I wasn’t planning on biting the witch. I’d only dared once, in the first year when I’d been starving and a different witch had led the coven. I’d been called on to awaken one of them, and in the throes of passion, I had bitten her.

She’d shrieked, and I’d swear that acid filled my mouth and burnt its way down my throat with every choking swallow. Their matriarch had thrown me back with a blast of magic that had pinned me to the wall and sent searing pain dancing through my veins. Whatever they did—tinctures they’d taken or spells they cast—it wasn’t worth the pain of drinking from them for only a sip.

Better the rats, disgusting as they were.

Daire sucked in a breath so deep that his nostrils flared, steeling himself before he stepped out of the shadows into the flickering candlelight I was allowed in my cell. I didn’t need it to see in the dark, of course, but it felt civilized to have a proper light when the witches remembered to give me one.

“Are you finally ready for your awakening, pet,” I asked, dragging my fingers down the bar, “or are you going to disappoint me and take one of those disgusting dogs to bed?”

Sometimes, the witches returned to the coven house smelling like fur. I’d heard the mumblings of rough voices, promises and assurances and deals struck with a nearby pack.

I’d never been privy to them myself, but the witches were after something I couldn’t give them, and I was hardly in their confidence to figure out if I could use whatever it was as leverage.

Blood rushed into Daire’s cheeks, and they turned a pretty rosy color. Accompanied by the quickening of his pulse, it was the most beautiful tableau I’d ever seen.

Fuck, I needed to get my fangs into something more substantial than a rat or a rabbit.

“I’m not—” he started, but he met my eyes with his striking green ones and clenched his jaw.

The clink in his trembling hand drew my gaze down. He was holding . . . keys.

Blood and fire, had I guessed this right? It was about time for the little witchling to stand up, and a pity for him to leave his own power sitting on the shelf when he knew exactly what he needed to awaken it.

When we both knew.

“I’ll make it good for you,” I promised. A jumping, jittery feeling in my chest tightened my words and made me sound overeager. Daire was precisely the kind of mark I needed—spoiled and dense, easy to manipulate. I’d make him happy, and if I was careful, I’d get favors in return. It’d worked before, but the witches who’d liked me best always disappeared one after another.

I didn’t think Ermengarde was callous enough to dispose of her own son.