Page 48

I blew out a breath, focusing. This time, I picked something else—the shame that lingered over how I’d snapped at Demos. This time, instead of bundling it tight and trying to press it together, I let myself feel it but imagined a blanket of copper over it.

“Better,” Raphael remarked. “I can feel it, but only if I try to dig into your mind.”

Better . So we tried again. And again. It was difficult to practice something when you’re supposed to make it effortless, and I had no way to know if it was working unless Raphael told me. Still, with every one-word-approval, I grew more confident that I could do this.

Time flew by. Surely Raphael had better things to do, but he didn’t rush me, practicing until finally I slumped in the chair, a throbbing headache brewing between my brows.

I gave him a tired grin. “Now you won’t have to deal with all my nuisance emotions.”

Raphael didn’t return it. “I’ve never minded, Samara. Not once.”

When he said things like that, it got hard to look at him again. He got up and moved to a decanter across the room, pouring bright red liquid into a crystal glass. It wasn’t the same dark shade the blood mead I’d seen other vampires drink. His throat bobbed as he swallowed.

A morbid question hit me. “Is it… good like that? Just at room temperature.”

He set the glass down and arched a brow at me. “I’m surprised you’re asking that.”

I was too. A while ago, such a question would have been inconceivable.

Just the thought of a vampire drinking blood was enough to make panic seize me.

But with Raphael… there was something I wanted to trust. And I was curious.

So I pulled a page from his book and waited in silence until he answered.

“It’s not, which is why most vampires exclusively take a source directly. This is little better than animal blood for me.”

I frowned. “What if you heated it over a fire?”

Raphael barked a laugh, as if I’d made a joke. I’d been completely serious. “That would hardly make it better. There’s more to blood-taking than the temperature of it. I’m afraid if I elaborated, you’d run screaming from my room.”

I snorted. “Yes, run all the way across the hall to my room next door.”

“See if this is more to your taste.” He reached around and picked up a covered tray I’d failed to notice.

The polished silver gleamed in the torchlight.

I moved away from the piles of important papers and took a seat on the couch, behind a low table.

Raphael set the tray in front of me and lifted the lid.

A single pie occupied the tray, still fresh from the oven.

“You keep pie in your room?”

“Only when I know you’ll be here.” Raphael didn’t look at me as he said it, and it was good, because there was nothing I could do to hide the blush that coated my cheeks or cover the little thrill that went through me .

“Thank you,” I murmured, lifting the fork from the tray to break the crust. It was utterly decadent, fresh-baked and sugar-filled.

The tartness on my tongue was vivid, and I swallowed with pleasure.

There was little ladylike in how I ate—not that Raphael complained.

I devoured the pie and set the tray down, a satisfied hand on my bulging stomach.

“Training is hungry work,” Raphael remarked with a hint of amusement.

“I feel rather like a dog that’s been given a treat for performing a clever trick.” Not undeserved, given the rigorous mental training he’d just put me through. Still, the image made me think of Titus’s comments about me being a spoiled pet. I fought to keep that out of my emotions and off my face.

“You are rather clever,” Raphael teased.

Titus’s spoiled pet taunt came to mind, but I kicked it away. I hadn’t seen him in weeks. Perhaps he’d departed from Damerel, whatever plan foiled.

We sat for a while, an easy silence between us. The castle could be utterly silent at times, given the quiet way vampires moved and noise insulation. In my rooms, sometimes it was too quiet. Sitting next to Raphael, it was comfortable.

“What changed your mind?” I eventually asked. “When I asked you weeks ago to train me, you refused. You said it would hinder your ability to keep me safe. So what changed?”

“Everything I said is still true. I do think you’re safer if I can sense your emotions.

That way I’d know if you felt you were in danger.

” Raphael leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees as he looked ahead.

“But… you wanted me to. It’s hypocritical to tell you you’re safe in my kingdom and yet curtail your wishes as if that wasn’t true.

Perhaps there is another part of me that was selfish.

That looked for an excuse to hold on to the blood bond.

But my desires should not win out over your own, not when I’ve promised you sanctuary, and that includes sanctuary from the king’s whims. So, if you want something, and it’s in my power to give it, I will give it. ”

I tried to make sense of what he’d just said. I swallowed.

“You really are doing it just to respect my wishes?” My wishes had never mattered to anyone before. Never been taken into consideration. Never had any power.

“Of course.”

Of course. Like it made sense.

“Samara, if you tell me you want something, I will do what I can to please you. Why do you struggle to believe that?”

My stomach twisted. “I was raised to believe that the surest way to be denied something was to let another know you wanted it.” An instrument. A hug. A family.

“That’s a sad way to live.” He didn’t coat the words in a saccharine way another might have .

“It was a safe way.” I took another bite of the pie, the granules of sugar melting on my tongue. Delicious . “Why was Demos upset earlier?”

My bid to change the subject wasn’t subtle, nor appreciated by the pained expression on Raphael’s face.

“He had… concerns.” Raphael said the last word slowly, like he was trying very hard to make something complicated fit in a tidy little box.

I told myself I was disappointed in the vague answer only because I was curious, not because I was upset Raphael didn’t confide in me. It didn’t affect me; I’d be gone soon anyway.

“Ask me something else,” he said, a peace offering.

“Tell me something,” I countered. “Something… something someone wouldn’t guess about you.”

He grinned. “I find I’m curious to know what you would guess about me, but I’ll play.” A pause, and his expression grew a shade more serious. “I never wanted to be king.”

“No?” I asked, surprised. I remembered how staunchly he’d told me he was glad he’d been turned into a vampire. I’d assumed Raphael wanted power. I would never want to turn, but the desire for strength? Recognition? That could be as seductive as safety.

He shook his head, leaning back on the couch. “In many ways, it feels like a choice forced upon me.”

I shifted slightly so I was facing him more, tucking my feet under my legs. “How did you become king?” Could vampires inherit? They couldn’t have children… organically. My stomach twisted at the thought of Raphael being one of those babes turned.

Raphael arched a brow. “The same way anyone gets anything in a world of monsters. By force. It was the only option that let me have what I wanted. But I own all my actions—every single bloody one.”

I considered that. I’d felt trapped at Greymere, with only one path way forward. But I’d done something bloody in my own right to escape.

“I was the strongest, and I was the most ruthless,” Raphael continued. “The years when I came to power… I didn’t waste time on politicking. There are those who excel at it, and they have a place. But me? It was a brutal, brutal thing.”

“What do you excel at, then?” My voice was soft.

He held my gaze. “Truthfully? Surviving. At any cost.”

He was a survivor. Like me. It was hard to imagine us having anything in common, but when he said those words, I heard the savage truth. I recognized it like I recognized my fingertips.

We were closer now. In that moment, I didn’t want to survive—I just wanted . My heart fluttered, the mental shields I’d worked on only half in place. There was no way Raphael missed that, and yet he was still so close.

But I’m leaving .

And I wouldn’t survive Raphael.

“Will you tell me what it’s like beyond Damerel?” I whispered.

If Raphael was surprised by my sudden conversation change, he didn’t betray it. He pulled away and returned moments later with a giant scroll. He pulled the low table closer to the couch and laid the map open for us.

I blinked. I hadn’t actually seen a map since childhood, and even that had only been due to the tutors my mother had insisted on.

The map itself was a work of art, but my eyes skipped over the ornamentation and tried to refit this map into my worldview.

I didn’t remember Eurobis being so large.

I planted my finger on a mountain range in the middle.

“Is this really Damerel?” The letters were curved in an ornate script.

No map from the Witch Kingdom would have named the vampire capital.

He bent closer, shoulder to shoulder with me, even though he could see just fine with his vampire vision.

“Though I rule the so-called Vampire Kingdom of the West, we’re more of a barrier between the two halves of the continent.”

“So what’s over there?” I moved my hand to the middle-left of the map.

“Other magical creatures capable of reasoning inhabit the rest of the continent. You’ll find kobolds and ogres, but there are other beings of power who have claimed territory.

” Raphael moved his fingers to the back of my hand.

I jolted at the contact but let him adjust my fingers to the north corner.

“The shape-changers live here.” He moved my hand down to a peninsula so narrow it could have been an island.

“The Winged Ones are here. There are more magical mortals, like your witches, only they don’t use magic in the same ways.

” He withdrew his fingers and gestured to the rest of the map.

“The fae have several strongholds, constantly changing alliances. You would encounter them…” He trailed off uncharacteristically.

I’d encounter them when I left. “Do you think I could manage there? I’m just a void.”

“I think you could thrive ,” he rasped. “It’s not the Witch Kingdom, where you have magic or you’re mud. There are many ways to live there.”

I pursed my lips. I hadn’t ever thought of it as unfair. It was just how things were. Besides, witches shared their magic with the rest of us through cards. That we paid for.

I turned away from the thought. “Have you spent much time in the rest of Eurobis?” He certainly knew about it.

“I cannot. The southern and northern kingdoms have closer ties. We trade through them, most often.”

Trade. The Witch Kingdom was locked between those kingdoms; we had no one to trade with. Sometimes it disconcerted me how much more to the world there was now that I was ostensibly in the world of monsters.

And soon I’d get to see an entire new realm.

By myself.

“Would you… visit me, once I’m settled?” The thought, silly as it was, slipped through before I could catch it on my tongue. The late hour made it too easy to say these ridiculous things.

He drew closer, his cedar scent licking at my senses, our knees touching. “Samara, there is nowhere in this world I would not go if you wished me to.”

He couldn’t lie. I stilled, my body frozen while my heart raced faster and faster.

“Too much truth?” His tone was teasing, yet his eyes were still serious.

Yes . It wouldn’t be a simple thing, wanting Raphael like this. It would destroy me. There was no denying it. Not after this night.

But it would turn me into what they thought, another human for the king to use. I had to translate the book and leave—

“Samara?”

I shook my head. “I can’t do this.”

He didn’t play coy and ask what I meant. “I’ll always respect your wishes.”

The sentence held a hundred possibilities I was saying no to.

The man who called himself king of monsters would always respect my wishes.

“I have to go,” I murmured, untucking my legs and pulling away. To avoid leaving on a bleak note, I summoned vexation I no longer felt and arched a brow at the vampire king. “I’m sure I’ll be able to find my way back to my rooms from here.”