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He leaned in the doorway, giving me enough space that I figured I must be looking less like death. He was polite when I was healing, pushy when I was well or bleeding.

“Do we even know that blood would help?” I tried to stand, not quite pushing to my feet but sitting upright and swinging my feet to the floor. I was preparing.

Eli came to my side as I stood, not infantilizing me but near enough to catch me when I tumbled--which I would’ve if he wasn’t there. He’d swept me into his arms, cradling me for a moment. “You are the least obedient patient I’ve met, Geneviève.”

“I waited for you before trying to stand.” I rested my head on his shoulder.

He said nothing, and we stayed there listening to singing from elsewhere in the house. Eli and I exchanged a surprised look. It was the sort of voice that should be immortalized, twangy enough to burn up country music charts and soulful enough to make sinners repent.

“That’sAlice?”

“I had no idea.”

We stayed there, listening. Perhaps it sounded a little better because the acoustics were so phenomenal here, but either way, she could sing. I enjoyed it. Eli obviously did, too. He began to waltz, as if we were at a ball.

“Can wenotexperiment on you? And can we avoid death, excessive bleeding, or dismemberment until the new year?”

“Yes . . .?”

Eli smiled and added, “And what if we just put a little of Alice’s blood in a martini? Beatrice suggested that it might aid your health.”

I scowled at him. “Fine.”

“Alice?” Eli called. “Could you bring Ms. Crowe’s breakfast?”

A moment later, she came into the bedroom with a beautiful glass of pink vodka. There was a lemon twist and cherry. I guessed the cherry was to hide the real source of the pink. Alice was as clever as she was bouncy.

In a chipper tone, she announced, “I made it myself!”

I held out a hand. I knew that the pink tint to my martini was a result of additives she took from her vein.

Truth be told, I’d considered trying blood, but it felt wrong. I had moral qualms about drinking from anyone, and I was fairly sure I shouldn’t have to do so. I’d existed for most of my twenty-nine years with a mix of vodka, green smoothies, and assorted herbs. Never sick. Rarely tired. Since the venom injections, I was always tired, and no amount of liquor made me feel satisfied.

I took a tentative sip of my blood-tini. “This tastes different.”

Alice looked at Eli. “I made itjustthe way he said to.”

“Hmmm.” I drank half of it. “It’s good. Spicy, though.”

She folded her arms and looked at Eli before blurting, “That’s the blood. He made me. I wasn’t going to lie, but--”

“Okay.” I drank the rest.

Eli rolled his eyes at me, and Alice stared at me in surprise. It was sweet that her loyalty to me made her unable to lie.

Honestly, it didn’t have much taste. Vodka. Touch of spice. My blood martini was surprisingly unexciting, despite the anxiety that I’d felt even considering it. The reality was far less exciting than my fears, and I felt like my stress was washing away—or maybe that was my hunger fading.

I wanted to be normal, whateverthatwas. I wouldn’t ever be human, somynormal was a little different. I didn’t mind the witch part, mostly didn’t even mind necromancy. I minded my paternal DNA. A lot. I was terrified of being adraugr.I grew up as the equivalent of a rose garden to every bee in range—but instead of bees, I attracted the dead. They were drawn to me, and I responded as well as anyone would when dead things popped up everywhere.

I killed them.

What did it mean if I waslikethem? If my genetic soup was more dead than witch? Necromancy worked by pressing life into the dead, and apparently, it worked ondraugr,too. I shoved life into them, and suddenly, they functioned as if they were a century old. Coherent. No longer slavering toddlers. What would happen if I was changing? Would I be unable to kill them? Would I be unable to heal? To summon the natural dead? Maybe it wasn’t that I wanted normal. Maybe I wanted to control who I was, what I was. Define myself.

“How do you feel?” Eli took the glass, unfolding my fingers from the stem, and I realized I’d licked up the last drops of my blood martini.

“Embarrassed.” I paused. “Better though. Energized.”

Alice tossed herself at me. “You do need me! I knew it. Like it’s ourdestiny!”

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