“I’m everyone’s type!” I burst out before I can think better of it.
“Exactly why you’re not mine, pretty boy. Sure, you’re not bad to look at, but I have zero interest in malewhores and the drama your kind always drags around.”
“I—I’m no such…”
My rebuttal dies on my lips. While I resent the implications of what she just said, I do have a six-hundred-year-old track record of sleeping with any female that piques my interest. I would have bedded Aimee just a few months ago, before it was abundantly clear she and Killian had a genuine connection.
I frown, seeming at a loss for words. I like to fuck around, sure, but I don’t see myself as a malewhore.
Am I that promiscuous? And more importantly, why does it bother me so much that she has this opinion of me?
“What is that up ahead?” she asks, pointing forward, thus changing the subject completely.
The black gothic spires of Drovillan dominate the skyline up ahead, a blotch of darkness against the cloudy canvas expanse of the horizon.
“That is Drovillan, our capital. We’ll leave your followers to rest in the city and proceed on foot to the castle. They can join us after we clear it with Killian and our men.”
“They’re not my followers, Blaise. We’re not a fucking cult.” She rolls her eyes at me, and the sight only makes my attraction to her grow. My reaction to this Fae is becoming quite a nuisance.
“Then what would you have me call them?”
“Call them by their titles. Dark Umbras,” she says, lifting her chin proudly. “Why are we not going directly to the castle? Seems a waste of time to stop in the city and go alone on foot.”
“Because the way into Sangeries is hidden. Tunnels under the city connect to our home. No other way in or out.”
She nods in understanding, and we fall into a companionable silence as the city starts sprawling around us.
We exchange the frozen mud beneath our horses’ hooves for cobblestones, and the forest’s trees brimming with snow for the stony facades of townhouses and the glitzy gleam of my favorite parlors. We’re crossing through the Plaisir District, and several skimpy-clad human girls giggle behind velvet curtains, fluttering their lashes my way and waving me over.
“We miss you, Blaise,” a girl shouts from one establishment, pouting her red lips and pushing her breasts up against the open window.
“Point made,” Sariah snorts from beside me, and I keep my mouth shut as I have no clever retort, for the first time in forever.
This display of sensual eagerness directed at me is not helping my case at all.
I sit up straighter in the saddle and give my horse a light kick, taking the forefront of the group.
“The inn is just a few streets away. Everyone can rest while we speak with Killian and Aimee, and then I’ll send my warriors to fetch them.”
After we leave the Dark Umbras at the inn, we continue our way through the city, following the winding river towards the entrance of the tunnels. Sariah’s eyes roam around the streets brimming with life in astonishment, lingering on the various vampire and human couples that we pass by. The denizens are preparing for Kronna, our most cherished commemoration.Crimson lanterns are hanging from every balcony, human girls running around with huge red-blooded snake kites floating behind them in the air.
The entire center of Drovillan is draped in shades of burgundy, a visual ode to Killian’s shadows.
A group of boisterous little boys, their faces painted red, are mock fighting with wooden swords.
A ginger-haired boy, who can’t be a day older than seven, runs directly into us. His ears turn pink as he stares for a second at Sariah, his lips parting into a toothy grin.
“Apologies, my lady,” he says before turning around and throwing himself back into the playful fray.
I stare at their youthful display for a second longer, my heart clenching inside my chest. I always wanted a big family back when I was human. It was my dream to have a loving wife and a house full of little noisy feet pattering on the floorboards and giggling voices filling the space with childish mayhem. That dream shattered into dust the night my family was massacred, and I was left to die in a puddle of my blood and theirs.
By choosing to live eternally as a vampire, I relinquished my humanity and those silly human fantasies. But was it even a choice when the alternative was simply death?
I still mourned those stolen daydreams whenever I saw a fragile human child and gazed into their unsullied eyes.
“What are they celebrating?” Sariah asks, pulling me out of my wandering thoughts.
“Kronna, our annual jubilee held in Killian’s honor, on the day of his coronation.”
