Page 72 of The Lost Prophecy

“Why not kill him without permission?” Charlotte’s practical tone stripped the question of drama.

“If Darcy kills a vampire without legal cause, the elders may order his own extinction,” Mr Hurst explained. “Wickham understands the law well enough to remain immediately outside the offence one can prove.”

“He is coming to the ball,” Elizabeth realised.

“Your sisters secured his invitation for him.” Mr Darcy’s mouth tightened. “He arranged that very carefully.”

“And now you expect him to commit an offence where you can witness it.”

“Yes.”

Elizabeth glanced at Charlotte before returning to Mr Darcy. “What does any of this have to do with me? Why did his eyes change when he touched my hand?”

No one rushed to fill the silence. Mr Bingley rose and walked to the fire, then halted in front of Jane’s former chair as though proximity to the place she had occupied could assist him. Miss Bingley’s fingers tightened against her skirt. Mrs Hurst watched Mr Darcy, leaving the explanation to him.

“Perhaps once in a century, a human is born whose blood carries a power our kind cannot reproduce.” Mr Darcy left the chair and approached the edge of the sunlight. “Our oldest texts call that person the True Blood.”

Elizabeth felt the room contract around her. “You believe that person is me.”

“I know it.”

“How?”

“You resist compulsion. The scent of your blood is unlike any other, and the ancient relics recognised you before I understood what was happening.”

“The punch bowl.”

“Yes.”

“What power does my blood have?”

Mr Darcy paused, and Elizabeth realised that every earlier answer had merely cleared the path to this one.

“If the True Blood willingly gives her blood to a master vampire, and he drinks it as part of the prescribed rite, he becomes human.”

The possibility entered his face while he spoke. For the first time, Elizabeth saw not the ancient authority he carried or the hunger he restrained, but the mortal life he had lost and never ceased wanting.

“And what happens to the woman?”

“She becomes a master vampire.”

Elizabeth’s hand closed around her throat. “He takes her humanity.”

“Only through free consent. Compulsion cannot produce the transformation, nor can blood taken by force.”

“So, that is why you cannot compel me.”

“The True Blood is immune to a vampire’s command.”

“Half the county has taken Mr Bingley’s hand in a dance,” Charlotte intervened. “Why has no one else remarked on the cold?”

Mr Hurst settled back against the sofa. “The coldness is there. Humans feel it and name it mere coldness—a chilled room, thin gloves, poor circulation. People are generous with explanations that permit them to keep dancing. Miss Elizabeth and Darcy, however, are another matter. The True Blood answers a master’s touch differently.”

Elizabeth’s fingers curled against her palm, remembering the crypt-cold that had passed through two layers of fabric.

Charlotte rose as well. “Mr Wickham recognised her when he touched her.”

“Yes,” Mr Darcy replied to her. “He now believes I intend to use her blood to become human.”