Page 12 of Until the Heart Stops (The Oylen City #1)

My dear Mademoiselle Searah,

I know you have asked me many important questions within your last correspondence, and I promise I will answer them to the best of my ability.

Yet I find myself caught on the valediction.

“Yours,” you signed it, and the burning flame of hope in my chest has flared so bright I’m surprised Oylen itself is not ablaze.

Are you mine, my darling? For I know you cannot mean it in the way that I so desperately wish. To you I am merely a stranger within parchment. But to me?

To me you are Amayah. Beautiful as the night, powerful as the dawn, and ever so out of reach. Yet I reach for you all the same—I reach for what I know I cannot have and will never deserve.

I find I cannot deny you anything, and since I cannot at present moment come to you to lie prostrate at your feet, I offer you the very next best thing enclosed within this package.

You ask if you are in danger from me. But truly, it is I who is in danger from you. For each night that passes I grow restless of this distance and of this charade. Each night I grow desperate to stand within the warmth of your light. For just a taste, even if it will mean my destruction .

Would you give me that taste? Would you spread yourself like an altar for my feast? I would drop to my knees as the most pious do and devour you like a sacrament. I think you might be my only salvation, my darling.

Would you allow me to be saved?

In place of a signature was merely a drop of blood, an offering as he’d spoken of.

The letter had arrived at our flat before the sun went down, brought to us by a beautiful Vyenur boy in his training uniform.

He’d said nothing of the gentleman vampire who’d paid him to deliver the small parcel, only that he’d received the order in the early hours of the morning before.

Which meant my letter had been delivered by Callum to our mutual friend as soon as he’d vanished.

I stood in the doorway of our flat, reading the letter over and over, hands trembling.

I could feel his desire, as if he’d imbued it into the page through that single drop of blood.

Perhaps he had. Because when I drew the parchment to my lips and inhaled, I found again the hint of spice and apples.

The scent skittered across my skin like phantom fingertips, sliding over my collarbones, down the curves of my breasts.

On shaky knees I wandered to my and Adrienne’s bedroom. Slowly I lowered to my pallet, reading over the note while the box rested in my lap.

“What is it?” she murmured sleepily, folding up the letter she was reading.

Without a word I passed her the note. The room was small enough that the ends of our beds practically touched.

She pushed her hair out of her face, the bruising beneath her eyes even more pronounced.

Through my haze I realized she’d need more serangunah potion to replenish her blood supply—Eamon must have taken too much last night.

She gave a sound of surprise before handing me back the parchment. “His desperation is…tangible.”

I nodded, unable to stop myself from reading through it once more, passing my fingertips over the blood leached into the parchment. It was like he was with us in the room, invisible like a specter.

“Lilith?” Adrienne called, as if she’d said my name before and I had not responded.

“Hm?”

Her golden brows pulled together and she gestured to the package in my lap. “What did he send you, love?”

Oh. The gift. His words had been gift enough for me. But I folded up the letter and placed it to the side.

The box was about the size of my palm, silver like the rest. I tugged open the top and gasped. There, nestled in the silk, was a crystal phial, stoppered with the same black wax he always used to seal his letters.

“Merciful fucking goddess,” I breathed.

Adrienne swore softly, the old springs of her mattress groaning as she rose to her knees to get a better look. “Is that…”

“His blood,” I finished for her.

Centuries ago, vampires would give their intended a phial of their blood.

Once consumed it would create a temporary bond, spanning a few days or weeks depending on how much blood was consumed and how powerful the immortal was.

I didn’t know much about the bond—I’d read that it allowed the vampire to find their intended regardless of distance.

But other than a few vague ideas, I was unsure how I would be affected if I was to drink.

Plus, due to the Covenant’s new laws, such conversations were taboo amongst vampires.

I wouldn’t have been able to ask even if I’d wanted to.

We stared at the phial for ages until I finally lowered the box to my lap and placed the lid back over it. “I cannot do this.”

“What? Why not?!” Her hands curled around my shoulders, shaking me.

A noise of distress slipped through my lips. “Because we don’t know what will happen if I drink his blood, Adrienne! And who knows who this immortal is. Do I want to give him this unlimited access to me? To my body?”

Heat curled through my belly even as I argued the point. I did not know this male and to drink would be beyond foolish. For all I knew this was an elaborate scheme, his tantalizing words merely a trap for my lonely heart.

Adrienne was silent for so long I finally turned to look at her. She knelt on her bed, staring at her hands tangled in her lap, nightdress sliding off one shoulder.

“What is it?”

Her shoulders moved with a deep breath. “If you drink…you will feel what he feels. His heartbeat. His desire. His longing. And he will feel yours.”

“Oh, Adrienne.” I covered her hands with mine.

She shook her head, lifting her crystalline gaze to mine. “I have not done it, Lilith…though he has offered many times. Enough that I fear that he will not offer again.”

I shifted closer until our knees touched, separated only by the thin bedframe. “You don’t know that, Addie.”

A small furrow appeared between her brows, her sadness tangible in the space between us. “He will soon grow tired of me, I know it.” Before I could respond she shook back her hair and gave a forced laugh. “But that is my woe and not yours. If you drink, you will feel what he feels.”

A faraway look passed across her eyes before she shook herself and squeezed my hands, rose from her pallet and crossed to the small wardrobe we kept.

“Will he influence my emotions?” I asked, deciding against pushing her.

A small grin pulled at the corner of her mouth. “Not your emotions, no.”

“But other things?”

The grin grew wider as a pale flush crept across her cheeks. “Yes, I believe so.”

Goddess . I could only gape at her while she dressed, twisting her hair off her neck and securing it with a golden pin gifted to her by the very immortal we spoke of.

She padded to my side, turning to give me her back.

Silently I finished the laces of her corset, tucked the strings beneath her skirt and pressed my forehead against her spine.

“If Eamon asked to change you, would you let him?”

Adrienne stiffened, hands flexing against the fabric. “I don’t think so.”

“Why? If you would drink his blood if he offered it again, does that not mean you’re open to the idea?”

She huffed a laugh, her neck curving as she dipped her chin. “Immortality seems like a monstrous prospect. Eamon is a rarity amongst his peers.”

It was true. Amongst those immortals who shared a similar age, he alone retained his kindness and warmth.

Most succumbed to their greed and cruelty long before.

I found a similar hesitation after so many years of living alongside vampires.

They could be as cold as they were generous, as callous as they were kind.

But was that not the same for all living creatures ?

The tension rippled off of Adrienne in waves and I sighed. “What would you do, if you were me?”

She turned, touching the back of my head gently the way my mother always had.

“I do not know, because I cannot imagine what it would be like to not know the immortal offering me such a bond. I can only tell you that if Eamon was to offer again…I believe I would drink.” Leaning down, she pressed a kiss to my forehead.

“I’m out to run some errands before I leave for All Souls. I’ll meet you at the shop?”

Dazedly, I nodded, tracing the edge of the box in my lap. When the door to our apartment shut, I reached beneath my thin mattress to withdraw the rest of the letters he’d sent, as if there between the lines I might find an answer.

I have watched you sacrifice yourself again and again for the betterment of others, Lilith Searah. But who takes care of you?

It is said that in the blood there are no secrets.

That in blood there is the beginning and the end.

It has been almost a millennium since I last saw the sun, but one moment of seeing your face and I find I do not miss its shine any more.

Would you allow me to be saved?

As if in a dream, I lifted the lid of the box, letting it fall to the floor. The phial was cool in my palm, heavy from the ornate crystal. As I broke the seal, magic hummed in the air, joining the identical signature that emanated from the ruby around my neck.

He had imbued the stone with his blood, that was what I’d felt, why already it was as if I carried him with me.

I pressed the edge of the phial to my lips and hesitated.

The sun was setting, casting long shadows across the floor.

He would be rising in a matter of minutes, unless he was old or powerful enough for him to wake before nightfall.

If I was to drink, he would know; he would be able to find me. Could I be this foolish?

My heart gave a hollow ache, tar-like grief turning to sludge in my veins.

The celebration of All Souls would begin at daybreak.

The market would be closed and families would gather to mourn and celebrate their dead.

Adrienne would join her family in the outer provinces. Noah with his fellow Vyenurs.

I would be alone.

The scent of thick copper wafted toward my nose. But there was something else, like the tart bite of apples and heavy scent of spice. I took another deep breath, letting the scent of him wash over me.

And drank the phial in one.