Page 11 of Blood Day (Blood Alliance #7)

Lily

Master Cedric can teleport.

I’m in a car.

Master Cedric said I’m not weak.

The thoughts spun through my mind in various sequences, my brain struggling to string logic to each one.

When he’d lifted me into his arms, I hadn’t known what to expect. Then he’d told me to close my eyes and try not to scream.

Before teleporting us out of the classroom and into a car park.

I didn’t even know this part of the university existed, as it was outside the walls.

Walls he’d phased through to reach his car.

A car I was now sitting in.

I’d never ridden in an automobile before. Nor had I ever teleported before. I hadn’t even known the latter was possible. I could still feel the wind on my face and the churning in my stomach from moving impossibly fast.

Or maybe that was the residual ache from being beaten up by Prospect Six Hundred and Forty-Two .

I’d thought the purpose was to demonstrate my weakness.

But Master Cedric had said it was to show me how perfect technique didn’t matter against someone twice my size.

And now we were driving into the night on a sleek black road surrounded by desert.

Where are you taking me? I wanted to ask.

However, I remained silent. I knew better than to question a superior.

Except I was likely going to die soon. If not from my injuries tonight, then from a future class. Because there was no way I could heal properly before my next sparring session. Which meant my time here was limited.

So what would it hurt to voice my inquiry?

Maybe Master Cedric would accelerate my fate.

Given how I felt right now, that might not be a bad thing.

“Where are we going?” I asked before I could change my mind. Not the most intelligent decision on my part, but I felt oddly emboldened by sharing my thoughts. It made me want to do it again.

“To my temporary home,” he replied, surprising me.

“Temporary home?” I repeated, my brow furrowing.

He glanced at me, his lips curling. “Feeling chatty, darling? Perhaps you’re not as wounded as I thought.” His gaze fell to my arm before returning his focus to the road. “Or maybe you hit your head against the mat harder than I realized.”

I frowned. I didn’t remember hitting my head. But that sounded right.

Every part of me ached, from my head down to my shins .

“It’s temporary because I don’t plan to stay long,” he explained, surprising me again with his answer.

It wasn’t my right to ask questions, yet he’d responded as though he didn’t mind at all that I’d requested clarification.

“I only accepted the role here to avoid a political request,” he went on.

“All of the other staff here have their own homes in the desert because they don’t really have a choice otherwise.

It’s that or remain at the university with the students, which a handful of lower-ranking lycans already do for security reasons. ”

Yes, that I knew. Well, not the lower-ranking part. But I had a lycan headmaster in my dormitory. I avoided her when I could, as she often tormented those who crossed her path. She struck me as angry. Very angry .

“I was given a choice of building a home or accepting royal accommodations,” he continued. “I opted for the latter because, as I said, I don’t intend to remain long-term. And the royals don’t often visit, which keeps the palace quiet.”

Royal accommodations? I’d never heard of that. I also didn’t realize that our Masters left the university grounds. No one had ever explained that part to us, as it wasn’t our business to know.

Yet Master Cedric seemed to be in a sharing mood.

Maybe because he was planning to kill me and didn’t see any harm in revealing these details.

Or he wasn’t planning to kill me but knew my time here was limited.

“While I understand the purpose of having a royal palace near each Blood University, it does seem rather wasteful since no one ever visits these areas,” he added, distracting me from my thoughts. “But I’m putting this one to good use, at least for now. ”

I blinked at him. “There’s a royal palace? For… for the…?” I couldn’t finish the comment.

I knew who the royals were. The purpose of my politics course was to learn more about the lineages of all the royal vampires and alpha lycans. They were the rulers of the world, each of them assigned to their own regions where they governed and ruled the lands around them.

“It’s a palace meant to house visiting royals or alphas who want to check in on the local Blood University,” he said, answering my question again. “In the early days, they stopped by often. Now, most of those estates are abandoned. Except for the staff, anyway.”

Master Cedric turned onto a new road, this one just as dark as the former one, his headlights the only source of brightness around us.

“It seemed like a waste of resources to build a home I don’t intend to keep.” He shrugged. “So I took advantage of my hierarchy in Silvano’s bloodline and accepted a room at the palace instead.”

My eyes widened. “Prince Silvano…” I knew his name and face from my classes. He had cruel black eyes, similar to Master Cedric’s. But the royal vampire’s hair was a shock of white strands, not dark like Master Cedric’s hair.

“Yes, my Sire,” Master Cedric replied, his bored tone belying the importance of what he’d just revealed.

Prince Silvano was a powerful vampire.

A royal. One of the oldest of vampire kind.

And if Master Cedric was his progeny, that marked him as extremely high in the vampire hierarchy.

“I only accepted the role here to avoid a political request.”

That comment took on a whole new meaning.

He could be eligible for a sovereign position with his bloodline link.

Which marked him as extremely powerful .

And I’m in a car alone with him.

“Hmm,” he hummed, his nostrils flaring. “Your fear is seducing my inner predator, little flower.”

His quiet tone just made those words more threatening.

“Breathe for me,” he whispered. “Inhale slowly and then exhale.”

I swallowed, only then noticing the burn in my chest. Because I’d stopped breathing upon the reveal of his royal lineage.

My lungs refused to operate, my mind incapable of controlling my body.

I couldn’t remember how to inhale.

Master Cedric’s palm went to my thigh, giving it a squeeze. “Now, Lily.”

I gasped, at both his tone and his touch. Warmth spread from his hand up my leg to my abdomen, making it clench as my lungs expanded with more air.

“Good girl,” he murmured, his thumb stroking the inside of my thigh. “Keep breathing for me, sweet flower. I’ll fix you soon.”

My brow came down. Fix me?

“But if you utter a word to anyone about any of this, you’ll die.” His grip tightened a little, something I didn’t need because the warning in his voice was clear enough.

“I won’t.” My reply left me on a wheeze, my lungs demanding more oxygen. But I couldn’t seem to pull in enough, my side aching with the effort.

His words had left me speechless, my emotions choking me entirely. However, this issue seemed related to my stomach more than my fear of him and what he intended to do.

I felt so light-headed.

My vision kept blinking in and out like it had during class .

“Ask me what political position I’m avoiding,” he told me.

I opened my mouth to voice the words, but they seemed too long. I didn’t have enough air. So I went with a guess instead. “Sovereign.”

His thumb did a little circle against my leg. “Your political marks are well earned, little flower.” He gave me another squeeze before releasing me to handle the wheel. The car moved around us, turning again.

Only this time, I couldn’t see the new road.

My vision had blacked out completely.

“Almost there,” Master Cedric said, his voice sounding far away. “Keep breathing, Lily.”

I did.

Barely.

By the time the car stopped, I felt like I was floating off in a cloud of nothingness. I vaguely sensed lights around us. My nose picked up on a woodsy scent of some kind. Then salt. A hum of sound. Strong arms lifting me from the car.

It all blurred together.

Until I landed on a true cloud of softness. Warmth. Engulfing me from head to toe.

Ohhh… I almost moaned, my skin reveling in the silky texture.

If this was the afterlife, I accepted it.

“Shh.” The hush against my ear was accompanied by the heat of a hard, hot male slipping into the cloud behind me. “Keep moaning and rolling around like that, and my plans for you are going to change.”

Master Cedric .

I tried to open my eyes to see what he was doing, to determine where we were, but everything remained hidden in a sea of darkness. His minty scent swirled around me, suffocating me beneath the intensity of his presence.

“Drink, little flower.” The words were accompanied by something warm and wet against my mouth. I parted my lips in response, trying to follow his command.

Something sticky and sweet touched my tongue, the taste causing my nostrils to flare and my thighs to squeeze. Oh, Goddess… I didn’t know what this was, but it was decadent and overwhelming.

“Seal your mouth around it and suck,” he whispered.

I did what he told me to do, filling my mouth with ambrosia and drowning myself in it.

“Swallow,” he added, his voice deep and sensual.

My heart raced in my chest as I complied. Heat spread through me, causing me to wince as it reached my tender arm. The pain had dulled to a residual ache I’d been able to ignore, thanks to the overpowering agony in my stomach, but it roared back to life with a vengeance.

“Keep sucking and swallowing,” Master Cedric demanded, his voice rumbling through me and forcing me to obey.

It hurt.

It tasted so good.

It burned.

Oh, but I wanted to make a meal of this liquid and never drink anything else again.

Such a conflict of sensation, both hot and agonizing. A sensually lethal mix of reactions that rendered me compliant against him.

I just kept sucking and swallowing, causing a torturous inferno to grow inside me.

My limbs shook, shooting agony back to my heart and up my spine.

I pushed it back, trying my hardest not to let any of my pain show, but it exploded from me in a hot wave of torment that left my mouth on a screaming gurgle.

Master Cedric silenced me by placing that liquid against my lips again. “Just a little more, then I’ll put you to sleep.”

I wasn’t sure what that meant.

But I tried to obey anyway.

What choice did I have?

His body was wrapped around mine, his arm clamped around me, and his hand…

My brow crinkled.

His wrist… that’s what he keeps pressing to my mouth.

My eyes flew open, my sight returning in an instant and stirring sharp spikes around my temple. We were in a bed decorated in black linen with a wall of windows overlooking the darkness outside.

The lighting in the room was low, reminding me of flickering candles.

And there was dark wood furniture beside us. A nightstand.

Another bolt ricocheted down my spine, drawing a gasp from my throat.

I sputtered and choked on his blood in response, then swallowed as it came back up. Master Cedric’s lips brushed my temple, his wrist leaving my mouth. His fingers whispered across my throat to my shoulder and then down my injured arm.

I bit my lip to keep from shrieking as he slowly extended it. “This will help it mend,” he told me softly, his mouth still against my temple. “I’ll hold you while you rest, Lily. And tomorrow you’ll feel invincible.”

I wasn’t so sure about that.

I felt like death.

Broken .

Unable to speak.

Suffocating on his blood.

Why did he do that? Why make me drink from him? Vampires drank from humans, not the other way around.

Had he wanted to taunt me with his ambrosia-like taste before I died?

Because I could still feel his essence warming my insides, his blood an elixir unlike any I’d ever experienced.

“Sleep.” The word was a breath against my ear, making my eyelids droop. It was an instant reaction, my body succumbing to his demand as though he owned me.

And maybe he did.

Maybe this was my end.

I wanted to fight it, to beg for another chance, but my mouth refused me. My body was already falling into the cloud of black silk, bending to his demand.

His mouth brushed my throat, his tongue circling my pulse.

This was it.

My end.

The final moments of my life.

“Good night, little flower.” His voice followed me into the darkness, his final words that repeated through my thoughts until nothing else existed.

Only darkness.

And… peace .