Лорел Гамильтон - Danse Macabre

«Am I ugly to you?» he asked.

«No,» and I traced the line of his uninjured cheek. «You are very handsome, and you know it.»

He shook his head, stopped in midmotion, again as if it hurt. «If I were handsome enough, you would have taken me to your bed and not turned to these strangers.» He lowered his head, both hands gripping mine. He finally raised his face, and he was crying. «Please, Anita, please, do not cast me aside so easily. I know that you did not enjoy the attentions I gave you as much as I enjoyed the touch of your body. But I will be better, I swear it, if only you will give me another chance to show you pleasure. I was trying to be too careful of you. I did not understand. I can do better, be better.» He buried his face against my legs, and wept.

«I believe we have our answer, ma petite .»

I stroked Requiem's hair, and didn't know what he was talking about. I was too stunned to think. «Answer to what?» I asked.

«The effect you have on vampires that have tasted the ardeur before. I think you are addictive, as Belle was addictive.» He motioned toward Requiem, who was clutching at me, still weeping into my legs. «He is powerful enough to be a Master of a City, ma petite , not powerful in the way of Augustine, or myself, but powerful. He lacks not power, but ambition. He does not wish to rule.»

«There is no shame to that,» Elinore said.

« Non ,» Jean-Claude said, «but I want ma petite to understand that her effect on Requiem is not a small thing.»

Elinore had sat back in the chair, curling her legs under her, because her feet wouldn't have reached the ground. «I had no idea she had bespelled him like this.»

«I didn't bespell him,» I said.

She gave me a look and motioned at the vampire at my feet. «Pick a different word if you like, Anita, but the effect is the same. We can argue semantics, but Requiem is besotted with you in a way most unnatural.»

I stroked his hair, so straight and thick, but not warm. He was cool to the touch. «He needs to feed,» I said. «Healing is going to take a lot of blood and energy.»

«I don't think blood will cure this,» Elinore said, and her voice sounded almost accusatory.

«What do you want from me, Elinore? What do you want me to do?»

«Make him your lover,» she said.

«I have four men that I'm the only sex they're getting, and two more that are in my bed some of the time. Hell, Jason makes it into my bed about once a month.»

«Exactly,» Elinore said, «one more will hardly make a difference.»

«If it were just sex, maybe, but it's not just sex. It's the emotional stuff. I don't even know if there's enough of me to go around for five men, plus extras. Call me crazy, but I don't think Requiem is a low-needs item.» I stroked his hair, felt him shake against my legs. «No, I think he definitely goes in the high-maintenance category. I don't think I have enough emotion left to do another high-needs man, okay? That's the truth. I'm sure he'd be a wonderful lover, but I couldn't meet his other needs.»

«What other needs?» she asked.

«Talk, emotion, sharing, love.»

Elinore shifted in her chair, turning her head to one side, her long hair spilling around her like a cornsilk dream. «You turned him down as your lover because you don't think you can love him?»

I thought about it for a heartbeat, then shrugged, and nodded. «Yeah, sort of.»

Elinore looked at Jean-Claude. «She turned him down because she does not think she could love him.»

Jean-Claude gave that graceful shrug. «She is very young.»

«Don't talk about me like I'm not sitting here,» I said.

Requiem's crying had slowed, so that he was mostly just kneeling with his head in my lap. I kept petting his hair, the way you'd soothe a dog, or a sick child.

«We all understand, Anita, that you are Jean-Claude's consort. We all understand that you and he and Asher are a threesome. We all understand that your triumvirate with the Ulfric and Jean-Claude must be maintained for reasons of power and safety. That maintenance includes sex, because he is of Belle Morte's line. I admit that I thought him a fool, and weak, to have allowed you such closeness with the wereleopards, but I was wrong. Out of that closeness came your own triumvirate, which has strengthened Jean-Claude's powers immensely. Your tie to Damian and Nathaniel is a wondrous thing. Your tie to Micah is a puzzlement, but I understand now that your powers are much like Belle's. She collected men, too.»

«I am not like Belle Morte,» I said.

«Your power is.» She pointed at Requiem. «This is proof of that.»

«I don't want to collect men,» I said. I stared down at the man in my lap. «I certainly don't want them this… besotted. This a level of wanting that's just wrong.»

«Why is it wrong?» Elinore asked.

«Because I don't think he has a choice about it. I didn't mean to collect Requiem.»

He looked up then, as if my saying his name had called him. The tears had dried to faint reddish lines on his face. The red didn't help the bruises look any better.

I touched the unhurt side of his face, and he laid his cheek in my hand, as if that one touch were something wonderful. «How do I fix this?» I asked.

«You mean how do you set him free?» Elinore asked.

«Yes.»

«You don't.»

I stared at her. «What do you mean, I don't?»

«There is no cure, Anita. There is only going far away from you. He will still crave your touch, but he will not be able to act upon it.»

«Like an alcoholic,» I said.

She nodded. «Yes.»

«There is a cure for it,» Jean-Claude said.

I looked at him. «What?»

«Love,» he said, «true love.»

We both stared at him. «True love,» Elinore said.

He nodded. «We loved Julianna, and she freed us of the addiction of Belle Morte. Belle Morte had Requiem in her bed before Ligeia ever touched him, but she sent Requiem on a long seduction far away from her. It was necessary to seduce both halves of a noble couple, so she sent Ligeia with him.»

«I thought that Requiem's master fled France so Belle wouldn't keep him.»

«His master met with an accident, and Belle was able to collect all the vampires of her line that the old master had made.»

«The way you say accident makes it sound like you don't mean accident at all,» I said.

«It was an accident,» Requiem said, softly. He spoke with his face in my lap. «The carriage we were in overturned in a storm. We were on a cliff edge, and somewhere during the fall, a piece of wood went through his heart. It was such an ordinary death.» His voice sounded relaxed, distant. «We tried removing the wood, but he did not revive. We learned later that the carriage maker was Wellsley.»

«Who's Wellsley?» I asked.

Elinore answered, «He manufactured carriages in London for many years. He was a devout man, and hated the idea of his carriages being used for evil purposes, so he had them blessed. He would make a batch of them and have one of the local clergy bless them. When the blessing is fresh, some of them glow around us.»

«The blessing wears off?» I made it a question.

«If enough 'evil' «— and she made quotation marks in the air with her fingers — «happens in the carriage.»

«Like a cemetery that's been out of use for a while, or had black magic used in it too much,» I said. «You have to reconsecrate the ground.»

«The analogy will do,» she said.

I looked down at Requiem. «And when your master was dead, Belle could call you to her?»

«Yes,» he said, «and if Jean-Claude had not given me a home here, she would have done so again.»

«How did you get away from her the second time?»