“Not quickly enough.”
“Everything must be done immediately, is that it?”
“As soon as it can be accomplished! You never know how close a soul is to the brink. Why do you think so many snap and go mad down in the dark?”
Kendrick urged, “Won’t you help me, Genevieve? I could accomplish much more with your assistance.”
She sobered, her shoulders slumping. “I can’t help you.”
“Why not?”
She laughed and heard the bitterness in her voice. “You think those vampires will let a woman be in charge? Not the ones grateful for your coin, but the ones who think might makes right. Who think their power gives them the ability to rule over vampires and humans alike.”
“This age is so backward. In my time, women had more rights and protections. They could even divorce a husband if they needed to.”
“The Dooms of Æthelberht,” she murmured. Even dry law code could sound like magic when her father read it in the original tongue. Genevieve shook her head, shoving aside the grief. “Sadly, all these vampires share this unenlightened perspective. If I tried to do anything on your authority, everyone would think I was your—your leman.”
Kendrick raised an eyebrow. “So?”
“It would erode any respect I tried to build! Gisela—Rupert’s woman—and the previous master’s leman liked the power that came with the position enough to make any who slighted them regret it through fear and pain. To say nothing of what the Master would have done. But no one respected them, and I heard all the resentment and hatred that was muttered behind their backs. I can’t become the target of such distaste.”
Kendrick crossed his arms. “Because you think I won’t support you?”
Genevieve threw up her hands. “Ugh, men! No. Because it would destroy any trust I tried to build with the rest of the Ossuary.”
“What if youweremy woman?”
She snorted and turned away, staring at the empty shelves. What a metaphor for her life. “No, thank you.”
“Not like how you’re thinking. If you were my wife.”
Her eyes flew wide.
From behind her, Kendrick said, “Queens hold power in their own right. If I am ruler of the Ossuary—lord, king, what have you—then you would be queen. And no one would have a reason to resent you for getting above yourself or enacting change.”
Genevieve said shakily, “Vampires don’t get married.”
“Vampires don’tbotherto get married. There is no reason that we can’t.”
She turned around and examined his face. “You’re serious?”
His eyes flared gold in the dark. “Yes.”
She swallowed and lifted her chin. “Why? Why marry me?”
Kendrick took a step towards her. “I need your vision for what could be. It’s very hard to see the way to anything different when you are as old as I am. I know things need to change, but you can see how with new possibilities. I need your hope. And a covenant between us would protect you and give you the respect and power to enact your own change without bringing the matters to me.”
Genevieve clenched her hands in her skirts. “And you’re willing to go through a farce of a marriage to get it?”
He moved closer and tilted his head to the side. “It wouldn’t be a farce.”
“What?” she breathed.
“Everyone would need to believe we were truly married to accept my authority conveyed to you.”
“Yes, but no one would need to know it is a—a marriage of convenience.”
He tilted his head, watching her closely. “They would be able to tell.”
