It would depend on how offended she was that he had acted like a barbarian instead of a gentleman and mentioned marital relations. He hadn’t missed how her face had frozen. But it had been true, and something they would need to consider. No vampire worth their fangs would miss what was or was not being exchanged. A relationship could be disguised without one or the other, but not both. Blood left a stamp on a body. That was why vampires—most, anyway—did not regularly drink from opium eaters, or any constantly inebriated humans, or those with blood sicknesses. Beyond taste, it left a miasma on a body, even secondhand. Regular blood drinking from the same person forged a scent connection.
She may well sayno, the pessimist in him prodded as he carried the book with him to his rest.She is under no obligation to trot out her demons on your say-so.
The thought unaccountably depressed Kendrick. He had found himself willing to slay any number of demons and foes for her upon seeing her tears.
Brought low by a woman’s weeping. He was not too proud to admit it. He could not think of a time in the last century he had felt so helpless.
Kendrick shut the door to his room and lay down on his bed as the sun crept above the horizon. Thumbing through the pages of the book, Kendrick contemplated what kind of man the author had been, to pen such stories that reached out through time to touch a man who had walked similar roads. What kind of woman was Genevieve, to have been raised on such tales?
Maybe that was what had drawn him to her. She seemed to breathe a different kind of air than the rest of the Ossuary—when they had to breathe. When he looked at Genevieve, he could smell the morning mist and picture the way the sun glinted off the dewy heather. He could picture the landscape the way it had been long, long ago.
Ossuary rulers, to his memory, had never shared power. A Master’s consort might have supported him in exchange for status and prestige—but they had never been equals.
Maybe they could re-learn a lesson from humanity. What better start could there be for the vampires of London?
As long as Genevieve did not find him too bad a bargain, of course.
“I don’t know what to do,” Genevieve whispered, having bared all to Elspeth in the privacy of their bolt hole. Sparrow was already asleep. “Elspeth, he wants it to be a real marriage.”
Elspeth’s eyes flicked up from the lace she was attempting to tat by one struggling candle in the few minutes before dawn. “You know that if every man was like Bacchus and Laurent, no woman would marry,” she said carefully. “But they do, all the time.”
“Is it all men, or all vampires?” Genevieve muttered.
Elspeth hummed in the back of her throat.
Genevieve pensively twisted a short lock of hair around one finger. “No, you’re right. I’m being silly. Nothing in his character has shown that Kendrick would hurt me.”
“It’s not silly,” Elspeth said gently.
“I have attacks of panic. Nightmares. I flinch when people touch me. How could I handle marriage and all the intimacy that entails?”
“You’ve really never…” Elspeth asked hesitantly. “Not since?”
Genevieve shook her head.
Twenty years as vampire had gleaned an insight into how human societal rules loosened in the dark. While some, like Gisela, sought a partner for power and status, others only wanted comfort and companionship amidst the pain, whether it be a brief liaison or a more long-standing relationship.
But Genevieve had survived by going unnoticed.
“It would be an obstacle,” Elspeth said carefully. “But I thought you liked him.”
Genevieve buried her head in her hands. “That’s the other part of the problem.”
“Well, he is right about one thing,” Elspeth said. “You would have real power to make a difference.”
“Because a man gave it to me.”
“Because he is inviting you to be his equal in all things—which is something Rupert never did for Gisela, as much as she wanted it. Kendrick would give you that—and his protection.”
Genevieve made a frustrated noise in the back of her throat. “Protection.”
Elspeth’s mouth pursed in disapproval. “Genevieve, we both would have given our fangs for protection five or ten years ago; don’t deny it.”
Genevieve couldn’t.I am safely free of Bacchus, but Elspeth is not free of her maker. It is not an unreasonable wish.“No, of course you’re right. I’m sorry.”
“Do you think a man would talk down to you as the wife of…what are we calling him?”
“King of the Ossuary? That sounds pretentious.” Genevieve gnawed at her lip. “He did offer to kill Bacchus, when we first met. And then looked very pleased he was already dead.”If I married him, I could extend the safety he grants me to others.
