Ruler [Blood Magic, Book 3]

Chapter 40: Mine

Keel's grey T-shirt was soaked from the last fight sequence Bruce had us execute. Nosferatu reflexes or not, a good, hard workout still made him sweat, and these days I did a much better job of keeping up. Even occasionally landing a blow or two. Bruce seemed as impressed as Ephraim by what a bunch of Nosferatu cells had been able to accomplish for my strength, speed and coordination, and he pushed both of us harder as a result. Or at least that's what I told myself, rather than he hated vampires and what Keel had made me and was taking out his displeasure at his new, fangy, subterranean home on us.

As I prepared to launch another right jab at Keel's abdomen, His Majesty cursed and tugged at his wet T-shirt, barely avoiding my fist as he twisted into a distracted and sloppy dodge. As soon as he let the fabric go, it moulded itself back against his torso like so much cling wrap. He swore again, checked to make sure I wasn't winding up for another attack, then tugged it up over his head, freeing himself from its sticky constrictions - and everything just stopped. Ephraim and Bruce's conversation, and the beating of my heart, though it kicked back up in triple time a second later. Holy shit. He forgot. The sudden hush gave the impression of all the air having been sucked out of the room, and my lungs didn't dispute it.

All eyes froze on Keel's torso and the thick thatch of wounds housed there, now mostly healed, but utterly unexpected on the skin of a king. Only Ephraim's gaze drifted back to me, and it was creased with the same heavy lines of disappointment and anger I recognized from our meal the night before, only amplified by about a million. He was pissed. More pissed than I'd ever seen him. Even as a monster I couldn't do right. Somehow he kept his cool until after he'd sent Bruce from the room, then he exploded on Keel. "I thought you said you have not been intimate with my daughter since-"

"I have not." Keel's voice was firm and sharp. "I would not deceive you in contractual matters."

I hinged onto the last two words and felt my anger rise to match my father's. What contractual matters? And what did they have to do with any intimacy I may or may not be taking part in?

"Yes, I believed that as well, but now I'm no longer certain," my father said. His eyes didn't leave Keel's chest the whole time he spoke to him, it was as if he wanted to tear open the scars himself and heal them, erasing his daughter from the body of a vampire. Of course, he didn't dare. He was too well trained for that. The muscles in his face were already tightening as he skillfully brought his rage back to a controlled boil. "Perhaps you'd better tell me what I'm looking at, Your Majesty."

"In the moment, it had been about her transition, about teaching her to give in to her Nosferatu needs, as we discussed." Keel dropped his wet shirt onto the mats as he said it, but otherwise held his ground, allowing my father to circle him, surveying the full topography of his scars.

I instinctively wanted to throw my body between Ephraim and the king as a not-so-human shield.

Don't, Keel warned. He must have picked up on the change in my heart rate or the sudden clenching of my muscles as they prepared to leap into the fray. It's just the Nosferatu possessiveness you're feeling. I'm not in danger here. Stay put or you'll only make it worse.

"Why did she not do this to her-"

"Bleeder?" Keel asked. "Strange thing. I gave her one - young, virile, fresh-blooded - but instead of bending him to her thirst, she had him swearing his allegiance to her. Can you believe it? Fifteen minutes and he was ready to die for her."

My father's expression shifted from anger to pride, and in that handful of seconds I saw everything that could have been if I'd met the sorcerers before the Nosferatu, then it swung back again. Cold, hard, distrustful - of both of us.