Wiping his hand down his face, he looks at the floor. “Monday when he called me he said he just wanted to know about you. He wanted me to tell him everything I knew.”
My heartbeat spikes but I don’t move from my position and wait. I need to wait.
“I didn’t have a choice,” he pleas. “I told him everything I knew about you, which wasn’t a lot to begin with. Most of it was what you had already outed in the infirmary. I told him how you slept all last weekend and about the blood oath. He had asked what your blood tasted like and I swear Mavyn, I told him it wasn’t good.”
Both Jullia and Hanna stay quiet, though the former looks cataclysmic and the latter is bouncing her eyes back and forth between me and Asher with curiosity and slight suspicion.
“I had to tell him the truth for everything else, but that was one thing I didn’t tell him about. I said it didn’t taste as bad as I thought a vampire’s would, but it was still stale.”
Hanna’s eyes slightly widen as she stares at me and Jullia shakes her head with frustration.
“Okay,” she huffs. “First of all, why does Thorne care so much? With that you also need to tell us what happened today. And second, why would you lie about what Mavyn’s blood tastes like? Why does it matter?”
Did I not just agree with myself about trying to keep my secrets secret? What a fucking bitch of a situation. Maybe the universe hates me.
But. . . at least my anxiety goes down. The panic that was reverberating in my chest subsides and I let out a long breath I didn’t realize I had been holding.
“She’s not a vampire,” Asher answers. To which I give the best performance of my life by giving him my most confused look accompanied by a ‘huh’.
Asher blinks at me as he sits up and stares at me. Surprised and confused at my reaction.
“What? No!” God this better be convincing. “The devil who scarred me used weapons with blue belladon. That’s why I still have clear scars even now. The poison is embedded in the scar tissue and over the years has slowly seeped into my blood. I’m immune to the one thing that will kill anything.”
Turning my face to the ceiling I close my eyes and sigh. All that I’m saying is all technically not a lie. That is the reason my blood tastes good and I smell like the flower. Even if I could be turned into a vampire I would never have that rotting scent or taste.
“I’m more immune to blue belladon than what should be possible. And because the flower has been said to taste like the best thing you could ever taste, I don’t want others who drink blood to go seeking it.”
Asher’s confusion evens out as he nods. “That’s why it helped neutralize Thorne’s blood and help heal me. If you mix a small enough concentrate with rucksile it becomes like a super healing tonic.”
I nod. “The deadliest poison known to all, and yet you can make a lot of healing remedies with it if you know what you’re doing.”
Jullia holds out her hands as she shakes her head. “Okay, okay, okay. That explains that, but why did Thorne want to know about it and why did he beat you to within an inch of your life, Asher?”
He rubs his face again. “The last thing he told me Monday was to get Mavyn to go to at least one of the parties. I don’t know why or what he wants but since last night was the first partyhe threw I guess he expected you to be there.” He looks up at me. “When we didn’t show he held a meeting today to which he asked me why you weren’t there. I told him I didn’t think you would be attending and suggested he just leave you alone. This is the aftermath of that.”
Jullia’s face falls as she goes to sit on the bed with him. He wraps his arms around her as her shoulders start shaking.
Staring off into an empty space, I cross my arms and think. I’m guessing he still doesn’t believe I’m a vampire. With all the proof he and the other celestials have been trying to seek, plus my unusual behavior – and I’m sure being a blood demon Thorne can scent my blood and the sweetness to it – it makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is why they care. Aside from Thorne wanting to drink my blood, it shouldn’t matter.
“Thank you, Asher.” I tilt my head at him. “I would prefer if no one knew about my blood. Not just because people would want to drink it, but because I don’t care to tell them how I happened to become this way.”
He nods and then Hanna steps in.
“Is that why you need to sleep and eat, even for being a vampire? Did the poison change your biology, even after you were turned?”
Good. I wasn’t sure if this excuse would work, but it seems being the only known person alive with the one thing that does kill all in her veins I guess I can make my own stuff up. Even if I’m not technically lying.
“I’m assuming. Even before I tended to need a lot of sleep and I would eat a lot of food. My guess is that it takes a lot of energy from my body to keep the poison from eating me alive. It’s why I eat a lot of nutrient rich foods.”
They also taste good, but I don’t specify that.
“It hasn’t been so extensive the last couple years, either I’ve been able to manage it better or my body has adapted to it. That’s the only anomaly I could think of that would make a newly turned vampire need food and sleep and not have a bloodlust.”
Hanna squints at me. “Makes sense, but you’re saying you’veneverhad a bloodlust? Even right after turning?”
If I was going to be honest I would say I’ve only once gone into a bloodlust, but that was long before I had supposedly turned into a vampire. Which means I can’t say that.
“I was hungry afterward, but not in a bloodlust hungry. Actually,” I add, “they had put me in a cell for a couple days before an advisor for the Mage Board came out to see me. He cut his wrist and even then, after not having any blood and not being given regular food, I didn’t so much as twitch at the scent.”
