A pair of dark jeans, a black t-shirt, boots. Weapons. Bottles of water and rags.
All were dropped at my feet.
I started stripping down out of my Rest attire. “I know the overlords are behind it.”
“Are you curious why?” Adelie zipped her bag up and shoved the strap back over her shoulder. “I think you’ll like the reason, be less pissed.”
I wet a rag down, my head cocking as I eyed her in silent question.
“Lord John took his final breath six months ago. He decided he’d lived long enough and chose his death,” she explained. A small, pleased grin graced her features—an impish look. “King Pippin has elevated to the Council. He’s now Lord Pippin, an overlord.”
My breath caught in my throat, the cleansing rag in my hand halting against my cheek. “You mean I’m finally being called as a possible candidate for the new queen?”
Her red hair shook as she bobbed her head in excitement. “Yes! There are two women before you, from what I hear, but if they decline the offer, then you could be the candidate for the next queen!”
“Oh…my.” My blue gaze widened as all my dreams flashed before my eyes.
Adelie squealed, jumping up and down. She even clapped her hands together.
I blinked. “You can’t do that in front of them.”
She cleared her throat and held her hands behind her back. Attempting calm.
“That’s better.” I nodded and began scrubbing my face once more. “I can’t believe, after all this time, I’ll get a chance at the crown. I didn’t think any of those overlords were ever going to die.”
It took one of them dying for a king to ascend to overlord.
Only five at a time. And vampires livedforever.
She shrugged a delicate shoulder. “Lord John was ready for his Eternal Slumber.”
My brows rose, and I wet the rag again. “He was the youngest of them all.”
“Now Lord Pippin is,” my friend hummed. Pleased.
She was so pleased with this.
But I probably had her beat. My grin grew, pinching my cheeks. “When does the official meet happen? When do I have to be there?” Because I wanted to be there now, my gut churning and heating from the magicalpull.
Adelie pulled out her cell phone. She nibbled on her bottom lip as she stared at the time and date on it, counting silently with her fingers. Her head nodded with her own internal thoughts, then her brown eyes pierced mine. “We have three days. With our travel, it’s cutting it down by half. But the overlords do have a private jet waiting for us.”
I sighed in relief. “Thank fuck I have you listed on my paperwork as an emergency contact with the Council. Otherwise, I wouldn’t know what the hell was happening, and I’d be killing left and right until I was sated.”
The killing I didn’t mind at all. Not being discreet would bother me.
Dead humans lying around normally tended to bring the nearby authorities.
From all accounts of the memories I had just stolen, that hadn’t changed in the past two hundred years. If a human was murdered, it was still considered bad.
Pity that.
It would be much easier if you could just dump their bodies in a landfill.
That was what the humans did with their garbage.
We should have the same rules. We were the predators.
I lifted my sunglasses, closing my eyes to clean my eyelids. “The humans still don’t know about us, right? I didn’t miss that clue with my feeding, did I?”
