“As if he cares two shits about me.” Ariana snorted now with her strangely newfound brutal tongue, thinking of how Quinn had abandoned her after their heady moment in his underground solar last night. But as Curio waved a hand at the door, producing a gust of cold wind to shut it, he gave her a rapacious smile.
“Come, now.” He chuckled as they moved off down the hall. “I felt you watching what happened with the Brightwatch this morning out in the street. Do you think Quinn makes such ostentatiousdisplays of power like that for just anyone? True, he was incensed that the Fae guards were harassing his allies from Corsica – Marietta Andrini is justterrifiedof sunlight, poor thing – but most of that was for you, darling. So the Brightwatch wouldn’t press harder to come inside the Hotel and seize you. Perhaps for the Summer Fae Prince… rather than their King?”
“You know about that?” Ariana spoke, wondering just how much Devi had told Curio about their sojourn early this morning, though she’d basically told Ariana to keep her own mouth shut.
“Devi didn’t have to tell me; I felt Quinn’s utterwrathwhen she told him, and it opened up our psychic connection. Quinn felt it when Devi took you off Hotel grounds early this morning, though he trusts Devi enough to use her own judgement about such things and gave both of you some space. He is, however, deeply jealous that Prince Lucca Bellari met with you.”
Curio chuckled now, though his glance was interested as he led Ariana down the vaulted corridor away from the main areas of the Hotel, not headed to the catacombs tonight. Moving down a curved staircase set with a royal blue carpet and gilded runners, they came to the ground floor, moving down another hall full of art with fountains to either side.
“Why is Quinn jealous that I met with Prince Lucca? Wouldn’t he just be angry?” Ariana frowned, wondering again about the connection between the Master Vampire and the Summer Fae Prince.
“Well, mainly, because he’s concerned Prince Lucca Bellari will sweep you away with his rogue Fae charms. And secondly, because Quinn hates competition.” Curio laughed as they passed through a series of colonnades into an open-air hall. Beautiful grottoes flanked this hall, a half-ruined space with massive fountains burbling from the walls, containing darkly mossy and lusciously decrepit places for couples to sit and make out. Ariana blushed to find quite a few even deeply engaged in sex as Curio pulled her along.
“So Quinn feels possessive about me.” Something silver-hot stirred inside Ariana again as she thought about that, trying to ignore the sex all around and failing drastically. As if Curio had led her down this path just to see her reaction after her massive magical moment from afar with Quinn, he chuckled rapaciously.
“More than possessive. Quinn wants to dothatwith you, darling.” As Curio nodded to a couple viciously fucking in a decidedly ripped state of undress in one grotto with the fountain of a grinning demon spouting from the wall, Ariana caught her breath. The man was a Vampire and had sunk fangs deep into the woman’s neck as they fucked, and blood tricked down her bare breasts as he sucked her and took her at the same time. Crimson and decadent, their world flowed with dark power as he devoured her and she cried out for more, clamping him close and fucking him hard right back. It was something Ariana felt abashed to watch as she looked away fast.
But not before that hot silver-gold energy flared inside her again from her rising magics.
As they passed through a doorway cut into the stone with waterfalls pouring down all around, it was like stepping into a dark grotto themselves. Passing through the waterfall without touching it, only spray misted Ariana as they moved into a mossy darkness, cool as a cave and just as black. As Curio touched a stone wall before them, the wall shimmered away, admitting them to the most beautiful grotto Ariana had ever seen.
An intimate amphitheater of natural stone, the space they had entered had a deep pool of milky blue water that waterfalls cascaded into. Ferns and emerald moss devoured the grotto, the stone of the rough-cut floor carpeted with tiny white bell-shaped flowers. Rainbows misted the space, humid and decadent as ancient vines crawled up every wall. Between their foliage, Ariana could see writhing demons and gargoyles and Vampires fornicating, carved into the rock. Water spilled out of the stone at carved openings like vulvas; and Ariana blushed hard to see so much sex depicted all around.
But even as she blushed, Curio led her towards five tiers of beautiful stone bench-seats carved out of one wall, forming an amphitheater in old Roman style. As people in Victorian-modern evening garb mingled with wine and small bites, Ariana noticed how pale and perfectly beautiful they all were – Quinn’s Florentine Vampires and a few Masters from the previous evening here to enjoy the evening’s entertainment.
On a low stone dais at the center of the amphitheater, a string quartet tuned up. But as if carved from pure bone, the violins, viola, and cello were white and seemed to glow in the waning light, swirling with a haunting blue color as the last shadows of the day touched them. As the tuning continued, unearthly in its tones, Curio led Ariana to a bar cut into the rock wall to get them both some wine. Stepping up to the highest row of stone seats, they settled in a side-box roped off by blue silk cords. The benches were deeply padded and covered in blue silk, and Ariana glanced around as she sipped her wine, watching Quinn’s people settle. But she did not see Quinn or Devi, and as the last of the Vampires found seats and the musicians finally nodded that they were tuned, she knew the concert was about to begin.
“Where is Quinn?” Ariana whispered to Curio, confused as to why she was here and Quinn wasn’t.
“Patience.” He murmured back, as a deep hush took the amphitheater now. As if preparing for some kind of momentous event, the Vampires around them had set their wine aside in niches in the stone benches, becoming very still. As the stillness in the grotto became absolute, everyone except Ariana came into a silence as deep as the grave. As they did, she felt the sun set suddenly, far out beyond the city of Florence.
And as the day died and night replaced it, the musicians began to play.
It was a haunting quartet as their strange, eerie instruments sighed through the twilight. One moment Ariana was listening; and the next, she was swept away by the beauty of the falling night, her body and mind borne aloft upon those haunting melodies. As diamond stars began to pop out in the sky far above and the shadows deepened in the fountain-grotto, she found her very heart and soul hushed by the beauty and the intimacy of the night.
All around her, life seemed to breathe; and it wasn’t the Vampires breathing. It was the night itself – the power of the night, coming to life as the day died. As her eyelashes flickered closed, she felt that beauty and harmony ease deep inside her, cooling her power and making it sing somehow, like silver and gold heartstrings plucked by intimate hands. And as Ariana came to a deep quiet, feeling the Life of the Night come alive all around her, she felt a cool-warm hand slip into hers.
And knew it was Quinn who breathed beside her now, rather than Curio.
CHAPTER 18 – BITE
As Quinn held Ariana’s hand in the evening grotto, his presence was deeply soothing yet electrifying. Sitting together in the stone box, she both felt and somehow heard his pulse speed beside her as their resonating magics breathed gently together, intertwining in the falling darkness. Suddenly, Ariana was keenly aware of his touch on her hand; a gesture so simple yet deeply intoxicating as the unearthly music sighed all around. Quinn’s presence was almost otherworldly this evening, and as Ariana turned towards him, she had trouble believing it was him who sat beside her now.
Rather than some incredible angel of the Night.
“Quinn.” Ariana breathed as the music played, watching him.
“Belladonna.” He murmured back, just as quiet as he glanced at her with his dark onyx eyes. “I’m glad you came tonight.”
Wearing an all-black modern Victorian tux, Quinn’s ensemble was made from sleek black satin, ruched silk, and accents of thick black lace accented with black diamonds, dark sapphires, and onyx like Ariana’s gown. Even though she was Fae, Ariana had never seen anything like it in the human world; and as she stared at Quinn’s decadent appearance, he held her gaze. His dark pupils and onyx irises were lost to the depths of the void tonight, reflecting the diamond stars high above. His sleek waves of dark hair were styled back, shining as they drank the light of the rising moon. The only real color on him tonight were his gold and onyx rings, ornamenting his long white fingers. As he held her hand, cool yet so warm, those rings felt like they burned upon Ariana’s skin.
A heat she never wanted to draw away from.
“Where is everyone?” She asked, suddenly gazing around to see that they were alone in the grotto. Music sighed from everywhere and nowhere all at once as they sat in the stone box above empty banks of seats, watching the waterfalls pour down haunting stone-carved faces in the depths of the night. It was like a dream as Ariana glanced around, wondering if the entire evening had passed as she’d stared into Quinn’s eyes.
Deep in trance from his haunting, passionate presence.
“Everyone’s still here.” Quinn commented softly now as he stroked her hand, holding her gaze with his drowning black eyes. “But just as we can no longer see nor feel them, they can no longer see or feel us. Your pendant holds a charm tonight, one I instilled myself. That when I came to you this evening, we would be alone… and would remain that way for as long as we are together. It’s a glamour of sorts, that prevents anyone from seeing, feeling, or hearing us, and vice versa.”
