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Mircea sighed and cupped my face again. He didn’t prolong it this time. His fingers gently stroked down my chin to my neck, and I could feel his power calling to me. His caress was delicate, barely a touch at all, but I shivered as a warm surge of pleasure danced through my body, driving away some of the shock I felt at Tomas’ actions. My skin tingled and a mist of sparkling, delicious energy rose between us. I suddenly knew whose wards Billy Joe had broken earlier, whose power we had borrowed to fight off the attack at Dante’s. This was the same giddy, bubbling, champagne-onice sensation I’d felt at the casino, a heady mix of desire and laughter and warmth that was almost instantly addictive. I knew I should be aggravated about the wards he’d put on my power, but no one could have bathed in that feeling and stayed angry. It was simply impossible. It poured over me like sunlight given form, and I laughed in wonder.
Mircea started when our energies mingled, then went very still. I barely noticed. I was happily drowning in a glorious, golden glow. It felt as though he was touching something far more intimate than my neck and, for a second, I actually thought that my robe had disappeared and a warm hand was caressing all the way down my body. I tried to swallow, but my mouth had gone dry and a pulse began to throb insistently in tender places. I flashed on a long-ago evening, Mircea and I curled up together on the divan in Tony’s study, him stroking my hair as he told me a story. I’d spent more time with him on that visit than Tony had, half of it snuggled in his lap, but I’d never reacted this way. Of course, I’d been eleven. Sitting on his lap now took on a completely new connotation.
Mircea was wearing an odd expression, almost confused, as if he’d never seen me before. He searched my face for a moment, then took my hand and bowed over it. I felt a brief touch of lips, then he released me and stepped back. The whole thing had taken maybe ten seconds, but it left me breathless, flushed and momentarily heartbroken, like the most precious thing in my life had been snatched away. I almost reached for him but managed to stop before I humiliated myself. I sat there, trying to lower my pulse back to something approaching normal, and stared at him.
I’d forgotten how much more personal vamp feedings were than what Billy did. I hadn’t thought about that aspect with Mircea, a fact that amazed me now. He had the charisma for which his family was famous, his power was great enough for him to win and hold a Senate seat and there was no denying his masculine beauty. I had, of course, never met Dracula, who died long before I was born, or the unfortunate Radu, but looking at Mircea, I could understand why the family had become legendary. If you met one of them, you weren’t likely to forget it, no matter what tricks were used to fog the memory.
I looked up to see Tomas scowling, his eyes moving back and forth between Mircea and me. What was his problem now? It was over. Then I glanced at my reflection and saw that my eyes had lost focus, I was rosy and my lips were half parted. I looked like I’d just had really good sex, which was not far from the truth. I quickly rearranged my face to look less like afterglow.
Pritkin appeared let down, as if he’d have liked to see something that caused pain, not pleasure. “I don’t believe you fed. You didn’t take blood; you never even broke the skin.”
“On the contrary,” Mircea adjusted his collar in an almost nervous gesture. “That was a feeding, if a very mild one.” He glanced at Tomas as if he was going to say something, then decided against it. He suddenly turned a wolfish smile on Pritkin. “Raphael will demonstrate it for you, if you like.”
Rafe had crossed the room and wrapped his fingers around Pritkin’s wrist before I could blink. Power surged out from the mage in a panicked wash, and I felt my bracelet shiver against my wrist. “I’m not going to hurt you,” Rafe told him, contemptuously. “I won’t do anything other than what was done to Cassie. Are you less brave than she?”
Pritkin wasn’t hearing him. His expression would have sent me scurrying for cover, but Rafe held his ground. He couldn’t do otherwise, having been given a direct order by his master’s master. “Let go, vampire, or by the Circle you will regret it!”
Abruptly, Pritkin’s elements were all around me. He warded with both earth and water, and they flowed out from him at the same time so that I felt like I was simultaneously being buried and drowned. My bracelet leapt like I’d captured a small wild animal that desperately wanted to get away. I fought to draw a breath and couldn’t. I tore at the neck of the robe, but it was no help; it wasn’t the material that was threatening to choke me. I gasped for air, but it was like my lungs were solid, heavy lumps in my chest that had forgotten how to breathe. I slowly slid down in the chair, my vision going dark. My only thought was that, in a room full of vampires, it would be my luck to get killed by the only other human.
Chapter 10
A warm hand slipped under my collar to rest lightly on the skin of my collarbone, and a brief tingle ran up my arm. All of a sudden the suffocating sensation let up a little. The air was heavy and hard to breathe, but I could manage it.
“Release him, Raphael,” Mircea barked, and I looked up to see that it was his touch that had broken through the mage’s power. Rafe immediately complied, wiping his hand on his thigh as if he hadn’t enjoyed touching Pritkin any more than vice versa. The mage shook with the effort of reining in his power. It continued to surge, but it was less violent, like waves lapping at the edge of a lake instead of crashing onto the shore.
Mircea nodded at Rafe, who went to the door and gave one of the servants an order. A few seconds later, another of the satyr-weres was brought in. He was a young blond male who, like the others, had reverted to his more nonthreatening form. His fur was a tawny gold color that complemented his hair and the faded denim of his eyes. He was easily six feet tall and as well built as most young satyrs are. If they aren’t born that way, they work at it—nothing is worse in their view than being considered unattractive, unless it’s impotence. Not that he had any problems either way. The uncertainty of the holding cell had wilted him, but he perked back up immediately at the sight of me. I forgave him; they literally couldn’t help themselves.
“Watch and learn, mage.” Raphael took out a knife and, with no warning, drew a shallow cut across the satyr’s chest. The creature didn’t moan, and I wasn’t surprised. They weren’t usually brave, but they’d never willingly show fear in front of a half-dressed female.
Rafe held his hand about a foot away from the satyr’s torso, and slowly, as if pulled by invisible strings, drops of blood began to leap across the air between them to splash against his palm. As soon as they landed, they were absorbed.
“We can do it without the cut, without any wound at all,” Mircea said softly. “Anytime, to anyone, anywhere. A brush against you in the subway, a handshake”—his gaze slid down to me—“or more pleasurab
le things; all will suffice.”
I held Mircea’s dark eyes and for a second I couldn’t breathe again, although this time it was my own body I was fighting rather than someone else’s power. No one’s eyes should be able to look like that, as if they held the secret to every dream you’ve ever had, every wish come spectacularly true. The hand he kept on my naked flesh was suddenly stimulating rather than comforting. His expression changed, and I couldn’t even begin to name it, but my body interpreted it as erotic. I had to actually clutch at the chair arms to keep from throwing myself into his arms. Damn, this was unexpected.
Mircea stepped away after a moment, and some of the river of heat flowing through me dissipated, but the longing remained. The problem, other than the fact that he might have to kill me on the Consul’s orders, was that I couldn’t be sure how much of what I was feeling was real, and how much was simply what Mircea wanted me to feel. I thought about that first night with Tomas, and his attempted seduction. I found it hard to believe that he’d been so overcome by lust at the sight of me in my big, cartoon-covered towel that he couldn’t help himself. Had Tomas acted on the Senate’s orders? Was Mircea doing the same thing now?
I knew Tomas hadn’t needed to touch me to feed. Mircea hadn’t told Pritkin, but a master doesn’t need tactile contact. Any of them could have drained me from across the room, pulling my life from me in invisible, microscopic particles that wouldn’t be seen or noticed by anyone else. And if they were as good as Mircea, there wouldn’t even be a bruise or other telltale mark to show that blood had been stolen. I didn’t think Pritkin would react too well to that tidbit of information, especially not with the hunted, half-panicked expression he still wore. He looked like a man who’d awakened from a dream to find himself surrounded by monsters.
I could have reassured him, if he’d have believed anything I had to say. Most vamps wouldn’t be able to feed from him easily, if at all. His wards were almost certainly too strong—he would have had to drop them for Rafe to complete the demonstration—and his training would probably tell him that some form of threat was being made. But a norm wouldn’t notice a thing, except perhaps for a slight feeling of lethargy. Vamps only left a fang-marked body behind in the movies, or if they were making a point. Tony would no doubt be receiving some shortly.
Louis-César took that minute to decide that Mircea had had enough fun for one day. “If you are so interested in our habits, Mage Pritkin, I can recommend several excellent treatises for you to study. This, however, is not the time.” He looked at his colleague. “The day is passing, and the night will be full. May we proceed?”
Mircea inclined his head and sprawled elegantly back onto the couch, pausing to remove his suit jacket and toss it over the coffee table. He also loosened the top fastening of his high-collared shirt, as if the room had suddenly grown too warm. The shirt was a thick eggshell silk made in a Chinese pattern, with little toggles holding it together instead of buttons. The material had a lustrous sheen, the kind that made you want to run your hands over it to see if it felt as buttery soft as it looked, but no design. His suit was also plain, unrelieved black, but on him the understated look worked. It was like a simple frame around a fine painting: all you saw was the total effect, and it was stunning. I shifted in my thick robe. I agreed with him—the room was way too warm.
Pritkin’s skin had turned the color of old mushrooms. I think some of the implications had started to dawn on him. He turned on Mircea. “Can you make more vampires in such ways? Can you call your victims?” I bit my lip.
Pritkin had definitely been out to lunch when Vampire 101 was in session. His ignorance made it seem odd that the Silver Circle would have sent him as their liaison to the Senate. From things the mages at Tony’s had said, I’d gotten the idea that the war mages had different branches, each of which concentrated on a different major category of nonhumans—vamps, weres, demons, Fey, and magical creatures like dragons. It made me wonder what his specialty was.
Louis-César frowned at him, maybe thinking the same thing, and Mircea held out a hand to me theatrically. “Come to me, Cassandra,” he thundered. “I command you!” His usual slight accent had thickened to the point that he sounded like Bela Lugosi. I smiled in spite of myself. Mircea’s sense of humor was notoriously horrible, but it did help to break the tension.
I snuggled closer against the softness of the overstuffed armchair. “Thanks for the offer, but I’m quite comfortable where I am.” In fact, the couch looked far more attractive at the moment, which made staying where I was a very good idea. I knew perfectly well that part of my trouble was the aftereffects of the feeding, but Mircea would have tempted a saint all on his own. I didn’t need any more complications, especially with a Senate member. He might genuinely like me, but in the end, he’d do whatever the Consul wanted. They all would.
Mircea was taunting Pritkin. “You see, my friend? Nothing. She spurns me. My allure must not be as strong as I thought.”
“Only a bite can allow us to call one of you,” Tomas told him shortly. He glanced at me, and his eyes were black with some emotion I couldn’t read.
