I pushed back the name, refusing to think of him. Yet my heart gave an uncomfortable lurch, every single cell in my body reaching out for him. I refused to begin the argument again in my mind—why had I not allowed him to seal the bond? Forthe first few days I’d had flashes of his emotion: the rage, the grief, the fear, with an undercurrent of love that had my eyes burning. I did not know if it was a mercy that I could not feel him now, that the temporary bond he’d created with his blood was gone.
“Can you read and write, Mademoiselle Valois?” the male asked, cutting through my reverie. I nodded. He scribbled in his ledger. “Any other special talents?”
My mother would have told me to flaunt my musical skill, to flirt, to be whatever this immortal wanted me to be. But she was no more my mother now than I was free. A flash of memory, golden hands on a piano, a shoulder pressed against mine. Music slipping through the space between us.
I shook my head. These men had taken me from Eamon, taken my life from me.
I would not give them that too.
Chapter Thirty-Five
My hands shook as I knocked on the door of the modest-looking townhome in Chynon.
What I had was less than a lead—a Vyenur had reported to his fellows that he’d heard screams coming from this particular house for nights on end—but I refused to ignore it. The news had trickled through lines of communication now fuzzy from the Covenant’s destruction, and had eventually reached Noah. He’d been fuming at my refusal to let him accompany me the last time we’d met, but I’d allowed him to get a few good hits in before I’d left.
It had been over two weeks since Adrienne had been taken. Two weeks of questioning immortals who had any ties to the Covenant. Two weeks of dreaming of her. Two weeks of waking screaming her name. I’d gone so far as to burst into Lord Montag’s estate demanding I search his premises, only to come up empty.
She had vanished from Oylen.
Last night Ralph and I had gone to her family home in the outer city, but the house had been empty. A few times she’d mentioned in passing her brother worked at the docks in the hopes of making enough to leave the country altogether. She had even taught him Kysoi with that hope. I’d spoken with thedockmaster, but he’d never heard of a Louis Valois. In fact, he’d never had anyone working there under that name.
I knocked again on the door, contemplating how satisfying it would be to kick it in, when it opened. The male who stood on the threshold was perhaps five hundred years old, maybe a little less—though it was difficult for me to tell the age of a being who was less than a thousand. His sandy blond hair swept back from his face with the wind and his eyes widened in surprise.
Lucas Landry was not a member of the Covenant, which meant if he had her, there were other forces at play.
“You’re…” he breathed.
“Eamon Azad.”
The male stared for another heartbeat before he shook himself and took a step back. “Yes, sire.Goddess, what an honor. Please, come in, come in.”
Slowly, I crossed the threshold, scanning each floorboard and stair tread as if there might be any sign of her.
“News has reached us here about your triumph over the Covenant,” he said, tripping over his words as he gestured toward the parlor closest to us. “I daresay soon you will be the ruler of us all.”
I did not acknowledge the comment. There had already been talk amongst our kind that I wouldtake overin the absence of the Covenant. But the thought was deplorable—I was sure there would be another way, we just had not found it yet.
The parlor was comfortably situated with its overstuffed couches and settees. Crystal decanters of synthetic blood gleamed nearby—a façade for what truly happened beneath this roof, if my instincts were correct. He gestured toward one settee outfitted in a beige damask, chattering about offering me a drink and any hospitality I needed. “I’m afraidthe last two givers I acquired were not suited to polite society, so I cannot offer you warmer.”
The scent of sunshine called to me, emanating from somewhere nearby. Fresh flowers caught in a springtime breeze, soured with fear and sickness. My muscles coiled to spring the moment I sat and I stared at the thick rug at my feet.
“A giver?” My voice did not sound like my own, dripping with ice and fury.
But my host did not appear to notice as he busied himself with a fine cut-crystal glass, pouring the thick synthetic blood into it. “Yes, one was a female giver. It was truly a pity, beauty that she was. Her mother assured me of her education and allure, though I should have known better than to trust Penelope Valois. But I’d heard from an acquaintance she would be worth forgiving the debt, but I suppose we are all wrong every so often.”
The edges of my vision pulsed while the male turned with a theatrical sigh, as if he was truly regretful.
I clenched my hands into fists. “And where is this giver now?”
He paused at my tone, steps stuttering as he made to cross the room. “My…my lord?”
My gaze slid from where she’d been kneeling on the rug, however long ago, to the doomed male before me. “Where is she now?”
“She…” He cleared his throat, pitch higher than it had been. “She was ill, nothing like what I’d been promised. You would not have wanted her, my lord. As feral as a venefica with all her scratching and kicking.”
Pride swelled for my mate.
“I could not drink from her without her illness, nor could I influence her. A-any time I gave her my blood she retched.”
