The dingy curtains were half-closed, sunlight illuminating a brown smudge on the wallpaper, which was a dull shade of turmeric. It had floral patterns of red flowers in teal vases, and I had to wonder how long it had been up there. Who puts wallpaper in hotels anymore?
I’d spent all night wondering about what happened on the day Lenore buried me. Had she revealed any big secrets? Had I? Was her master plan to simply get me out of the way so she could have Christian? No wonder she looked slightly peeved the first time I saw her afterward. She hadn’t expected anyone to find me for a long time. She could have killed me when we took that little trip to the lake, but I think she was feeling me out to see if I remembered anything. And the whole time, she’d been working me over, trying to give me advice and make me trust her.
I noticed her bed was made. “Do you know where Christian is?”
“Dear, oh dear. Have you already lost your beau? He has a tendency to wander off, doesn’t he?”
She closed the door, which put me on edge. Her Vampire powers might have returned, so I casually avoided eye contact by moseying over to the window. A man in a red scarf busily taped flyers to the telephone poles.
“This room smells like death and cigarettes,” she said conversationally. “Humans are so tragically pathetic—wasting away what little time they have.”
“And yet humans are responsible for most of the modern inventions and conveniences that you enjoy.”
“Such as this hotel?”
I scanned the rooftops and street to see if Christian might have switched locations.
“When I imagined my death, I never imagined this,” she said.
I chuckled and turned around. “Not as theatrical as your head on a spike?”
She folded her arms. “They used to burn us. Every other Breed was beheaded, but they loved putting a Vampire on the flames. When they found a coven, they would stake them with impalement wood first, tie them to their mates, and light the pyre.”
I strode to the edge of the dresser and leaned against it. “Didn’t the impalement wood eventually burn up? Couldn’t they escape?”
“How far do you think they could crawl? Even if they could escape, most didn’t want to after hearing the screams of their mate while they died an agonizing death. Entire covens were wiped out. Eventually men saw love as a weakness. As more female Vampires died, fewer replaced them. Younglings were loyal men who served as protectors to their maker. But women? We were nothing but bloodslaves. Our blood is more addictive than a man’s.”
“You should save those stories for Christmas parties.”
“Maybe you’d like to hear about those who regenerated from the pile of bodies. If not beheaded, a Vampire has to burn all the way to the bones to guarantee death. Otherwise, there’s always a chance they can regenerate. Slowly. But much quicker if they have access to blood, especially Vampire blood. I’ve heard it’s a painful and grueling process to have all your flesh and organs regenerate. One man I heard about crawled through the wilderness, feeding off vermin for five years before he was whole again.”
“And if a wolf tears apart your limbs?”
She shrugged. “It depends on how strong the Vampire is. If the bones separate from the body, it’s not likely they’ll come back. Wolves tear apart the body to incapacitate and sometimes eat them. And they typically finish off with the head. If you’re going to attack a Vampire, you better finish the job. Most wolves do.”
“I’ll make a note of that.”
Lenore reclined her head against the wall, her blond hair perfectly styled, her gown like something out of a dream. “You’re fearless, Raven Black. The way you saved Viktor, not knowing what Sparrow might do. Does no one intimidate you?”
Someone did, but I pushed that memory of Fletcher down and kept my gaze fixed on her short silver heels. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for Viktor. He changed my life.”
“It seems that you and I feel the same in that regard.” She drifted toward me, the fabric of her dress lightly caressing her bony legs with each step. “Raven, I’m calling on that favor you owe me for the loan. I need you to go back to my house and get something.”
“Get what?”
“A bottle of alcohol.”
Was she an idiot? “There’s a liquor store across the street on the corner.”
A smile touched her lips, and she shook her head. “If you know Viktor, you know that he doesn’t appreciate cheap human alcohol. I recently acquired a bottle of vodka distilled by a pack in his home country. I’ve been saving it for a special occasion.”
“I guess nothing is more special than being half-dead.”
“No, dear. You don’t seem to grasp the reason for celebration. Viktor didn’t exactly pronounce his unwavering love for me, but he protected my honor, and that’s something. It doesn’t matter if he can’t taste it—it’s the sentiment that counts. You’ll find it on the second floor in a library to the right of the stairs. The bottle has a black label with Russian letters you won’t be able to read.”
“What do they say?”
“The translation of the brand is White Wolf.”
