No heartbeat. Because he’s a vampire. Who you let drink your blood.

“Put me down,” I demanded.

Raphael gently lowered me to the ground, and I turned away from him. Alphonse, to my immense relief, had not been eaten by an ogre in our absence. I slid the Black Grimoire into Alphonse’s saddlebag. It took my hands an extra moment to release the book, but I let it go with a caress against the edges. Maybe because I’d nearly died half a dozen times getting it.

Raphael didn’t miss the movement. “Do you know Old Runyk?”

He must have seen me reading the walls in the temple. Though it begged the question: How did Raphael know it? “A little. I studied as a child, but it’s been many years since I’ve come across it. Do you?”

“Only enough to recognize it.” Raphael considered me, clearly weighing something more. “Do you think you could learn to read the grimoire?”

I scoffed by reflex, then looked back at the book. Could I? I hadn’t studied anything academic in ages. “It would be useless without a witch who can use the grimoire.”

Raphael nodded, reluctantly, letting the subject drop. Neither of us moved onto Alphonse.

Now what?

I’d gone with Raphael on this little retrieval quest—not realizing exactly how perilous the abandoned temple would be—because he’d taken care of me while I healed, and I was out of options. The Monastery would never take me back, and no matter how I wanted to survive, there was no way I could put myself through that again.

But without Raphael around… at best, I could hope to reach some farm out on the edges of the kingdom that could use a pair of hands only used to rat catching. Would I be safe there? They might not look for me specifically, but every once in a while, they tracked criminals via magical means. They would find me. Without the Monastery to stand in their way, I’d eventually be found and executed. I had no money, no skills, no refuge.

“What is it?” Raphael asked.

I have nowhere to go. “I’m… not sure what my next steps are.” For years, I’d worked towards my goal of starting a new life at the Monastery. Now I was lost. Each step seemed to edge me closer and closer to the precipice of a cliff. I fingered the flap of the saddlebag, even now wanting to soothe myself by holding the grimoire.

“There’s more to Eurobis than the Witch Kingdom,” Raphael said, voice soft.

I glanced at him, then realized: “You mean the lands beyond the Vampire Kingdom?”

Raphael’s expression said that wasn’t quite what he meant, but now that the idea hit me, new air filled my lungs. I’d never considered moving beyond the Witch Kingdom, because the vampires had us locked in. There was no way out except through their domain, and no one would choose that.

But I had a vampire. “Could you get me safe passage through the Vampire Kingdom and out to the west?” No soldier in the king’s army would ever be able to hunt me down there.

“I… could.” Raphael seemed to hesitate, unlike his usual, assured speech.

I was too relieved to care. I drew myself up onto the horse and tried not to tense when Raphael sat behind me once more, his hand coming across my middle to hold me steady as we began to move.

“You’re uneasy,” he said. “Why?”

Was my body so obvious? “I’m fine.”

He snorted and stalled Alphonse. “That’s a lie.”

I was uneasy because the vampire was holding me again, and unlike before, I couldn’t ask him to just let me down. Nor did his steadying touch feel like it had when we’d first been forced to ride together, like something I had to endure for survival.

It felt like something I might want.

The way he’d looked at me after feeding…

“Won’t you have trouble being this close to my neck?” I blurted.

“I’ll restrain myself,” he replied.

That didn’t make me feel better.

“Relax, Samara. I won’t bite you again.”

Finally, the tension in my shoulders eased. There was quiet determination in his words, and I found myself trusting them. At least, until he added—

“Not without permission, anyway.”

He clicked his heels, and Alphonse began to move again before I could finish stammering my vows that that would never, ever, ever happen again. Even as his reassurance made me recall exactly how my body had heated when he’d bitten me, the pleasure his fangs had wrought that had me imagining a repeat.

Never.

Raphael’s assurances weren’t exactly convincing. I managed to keep quiet until we hit the edge of the marshes, when I finally dared ask: “Now what?”

“Now,” Raphael said, “you come home to Damerel with me.”

To the Vampire Kingdom.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter Twenty-Four

Snowfall stalled our trip.

We completed two days’s journey before the snow began. This late in spring? A bad omen. A sign something was amiss.

Like a human willingly going to the Vampire Kingdom.

Temporarily, at least. Raphael insisted it would be safe to rest there for at least a few days. I wasn’t fond of the plan by any means, but I needed supplies. I’d used almost all the cards available and had only a few coins left. Going to the Vampire Kingdom was terrifying, but the promise of a new life where no one knew me—or wanted me dead—was enticing enough to make me look past it. And while I had reservations about being in the home of other vampires, a part of me trusted Raphael would be true to his word and keep me safe.

With the Black Grimoire in our possession—and no more disguise cards—Raphael refused to consider going near any human settlement. Which presented a problem, since unlike the vampire, I was decidedly not impervious to the cold. I’d used the enchanted warmth card on my cloak days before, when the cold had first settled around us, but its magic was waning. Fortunately, one of the cards I’d traded for in the first village had been a shelter card.

Unfortunately, the “shelter” that sprang from the enchantment wasn’t the inn-sized tent promised in the picture. It was a tent, with a ceiling maybe two feet tall, twice as wide, and four times as long. A threadbare folded blanket appeared at its center.

It was a glorified sleeping bag.

“That d-dealer ripped me off,” I groused between chattering teeth. “We’ll ha-have to find an inn. Or at least a h-house.” It was so cold my fingers were turning an even starker white. I didn’t care who Raphael had to thrall to get us somewhere warm.

“This will be fine,” Raphael said. “The storm doesn’t seem too bad. It should break overnight.”

I hated that I recognized by the tone of his voice there’d be no arguing. Unwilling to stay out in the cold a minute longer, I slid into the tent. It was hardly better than being outside, except there was no snow in the tent.

I’d used up all the fire cards in the temple and didn’t stand a chance of making a flame without magic. I curled up, pressing my body as close together as possible. Whatever could be said about Greymere, it had never been cold like this. In fact, growing up as I had, I’d never known cold like this at all. Any chill that permeated the great halls was quickly chased off with a heating spell. I clutched the tattered blanket closer. It was a poor substitute for real warmth.

The cold made it hard to think or feel. I had to resign myself to the fact it would be a long night. But I’d survive it. Probably. I shut my eyes and prepared to rest.

Then the entrance of the tent jostled.

My eyes flew open as Raphael moved through the small entrance.

“What are you d-doing?”

“You’ll hardly avoid freezing to death with this tent alone.”

I blinked at him, and in the time it took my ice-addled brain to process, he had slid beside me in the minuscule tent. His arm pinned me down, his body curved around my back. The thin blanket of my cloak was the only barrier between us.