Текст книги "A vow of blood and tears"

Автор книги: Cate Corvin

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Текущая страница: 6 (всего у книги 41 страниц)

Wyn had been very cavalier in harvesting my blood whenever she pleased. Despite the new laws about vampires requiring direct consent in order to drink from humans, I no longer lived in a world where those human laws could be counted on. Would I be expected to bleed for any vampire who asked?

Or would being Bane’s wife, under his aegis, protect me from such a thing?

I kept my questions to myself, to be put to paper another time, and followed Wyn back into the candlelit halls of the keep.

This time she led me in another direction, down a set of stairs, and the hall abruptly opened onto a wide hall, lit with crystalline chandeliers overhead and gold sconces on the walls. The grandeur was astonishing, when the outside of the castle appeared so defensive and utilitarian, especially after a lifetime of thinking the inside of the Silver Cathedral qualified as grand.

The Cathedral did not hold a candle to this keep, with its black marble floors polished so smooth it appeared we walked on a pool of dark water, or the delicate stonework buttressing the high ceiling. A faint, sweet scent hung in the air, enticing my nose.

And the people… or the vampires, as they really were.

Besides the maids, I picked out only one or two humans. The rest were clearly vampires, with their flawless skin, the slit pupils in faintly-glowing eyes, the incisors hidden behind plush lips.

Every vampire but Wyn was wearing armor, each armed to the teeth, and most of them maintained their posts as we passed. I felt their eyes moving over me, and once or twice saw nostrils flare as they caught my scent.

My skin prickled, especially when one particularly burly vampire, his blond hair pulled back in a horsetail to show off cut cheekbones and a chiseled mouth, licked his lips, his blue eyes glued to my exposed throat.

He was the kind of vampire the books were written about. The handsome knight in armor, eternally perfect. His mouth was formed in undeath to draw the eye, to make one want to melt into his arms and tip the head back just so…

And I wanted nothing to do with it. I couldn’t fathom such a thing.

My husband was something else, something far beyond this.

Something so different that even the vampires themselves considered his existence to be a sacrifice.

Not a vampire… but a monster.

I ran through the wyrd-runes in my head again, my favorite method of maintaining my composure, and followed Wyn up a pair of wide, scrolling stairs, my white dress trailing behind me like a veil.

She brought me to an unassuming door, as thick and well-defended as the rest, and opened it into a loggia surrounding a courtyard. I knew the moment I stepped foot into the Bloodgarden, the scent that had been haunting me all throughout the keep finally blooming.

Roses. All around us, roses by the thousands.

The courtyard was in the middle of the keep, surrounded on all sides by the high, dark walls of Ravenscry, and it was large enough to almost serve as a park.

In the day, it would be a fairy tale. By night, with the crescent moon gleaming overhead, it was a dark shadow whispering of romance and seduction. The roses grew on everything, climbing up the walls of the castle, twining around stone balustrades.

More of Bane’s legions were here, patrolling the edges of the courtyard, keeping watch from balconies high overhead. There was no escape from the sensation of eyes watching me.

“This is a holy place,” Wyn said in a low voice. “The bloodroses and their thorns are sacred to our Mother. You will find no ritual conducted by our kind that doesn’t take her symbols into account, and we treat this garden with great reverence.”

I read between the lines: if I damaged anything in this garden in an attempt to flee, they would find me wanting, and the punishment was unlikely to be pleasant.

The smooth trail of stones underfoot brought us through the Bloodgarden in a winding path, and Wyn finally slowed as we approached a fountain set in the wall.

But it was not just any fountain; where the face of a protective gargoyle or green man might have been carved in a human’s garden, in this one there was a pale bust of a woman, her head tipped back, eyes closed, mouth open to reveal gleaming marble fangs. Her cupped hands formed the bowl of the fountain.

I swallowed hard, staring at that empty bowl and wondering if it was truly meant for water, or something thicker.

“Stand here,” Wyn said quietly, positioning me to the left of the fountain. “This will be a small, quick ceremony. Don’t worry, Cirrien dear; we’ll be with you every step of the way, and by midnight you’ll be wed and the Accords will be met.”

I laced my hands in front of myself, mouth dry, heart pounding a rapid tattoo against my breastbone.

Thus far I had managed to maintain my composure in this marriage.

So long as I didn’t think about what came after the vampires considered us properly married.

For a few brief minutes, it was only Wyn and me by the fountain, and despite the easy quiet around us, my heart beat faster and faster. Several shadows slipped from the darkness on silent feet; vampires, all of them, looking like courtiers in intricate brocade and jewels.

Their thin pupils fixed on me, some skeptical, others reassured as they glanced between me and the bloodwitch. Perhaps they were expecting me to have to be hogtied, but Wyn did not have so much as a finger prepared to grab me.

This is for Veladar, I reminded myself. This keeps the wolf from the door. 

I recognized Visca as she stepped into the courtyard, her friendly, crooked smile wide. She still wore her armor, but she held out an arm like a gentleman, ushering an even more massive shadow past herself. I had to crane my head to find the gleam of golden eyes.

Bane. I exhaled, a knot in my chest loosening. Had I really been worried that he wouldn’t arrive when I was terrified of what was to come?

But I hadn’t seen him all day, and our last exchange had been… less than friendly. I felt a faint burn of shame that he had heard me cry, and thought it was because of him.

I did my best to muster up a smile, but the presence of so many vampires was unnerving, and it wobbled and fell.

Bane stepped closer, on the other side of the fountain, and then I saw him in the light spilling from the castle and almost recoiled.

He had been monstrous when I first laid eyes on him, but this… the primitive lines of his face were even more bestial now, exaggerated into sharp peaks and valley. His lips could not fully close over his fangs; his body had thickened, plates of armor-like cartilage warping the shape of his shirt.

My heart started racing again, and I reminded myself that he had left me paper and a book. He had done it from the kindness of his heart; there was more to be seen in him than met the eye.

Took you long enough, I signed, trying for a hint of playfulness, to show that I wasn’t afraid of him. Were you having second thoughts?

He did not meet my gaze. I lowered my hands, reknotting them in front of myself. He didn’t understand; that was fine. Everything would be fine.

The fiend moved closer, slowly; there was something in his posture that spoke of nervousness, his shoulders held higher as though in defense.

He raised his hands, displaying dark claws that had been hastily cut down and filed to bluntness, and I just managed to not flinch.

And then he made words, his large, powerful hands clumsy in forming them, but still legible to me.

Not fear. Not hurt… you. Marry me. 

The last one might have been ‘cats’, his thumb crooked a little too low, the gesture performed awkwardly, but I was sure he meant ‘marry’.

He had spoken to me.

In my own language.

I took a deep breath, wanting to say ‘yes’ to him, to say the most important word of my life out loud for once. To feel the weight of it in the air.

But it wouldn’t come.

Instead, I stared at those brutal hands, still hovering hesitantly in the air, shaping words he had learned solely to speak to me. He had learned it… for me.

He was the first person in my life to ever try to hear my words, to return them in kind.

Without warning, tears spilled over.

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Chapter 8 Bane

Inearly recoiled from the sight of Cirrien, tears pouring down her cheeks, staring at me with… dismay? Horror?

Only the bracing presence of Visca at my back, the thin cut of Wyn’s mouth, and the press of my highest-ranking legionnaires around us kept me in place.

None of them would allow her to leave. Now that she was here, the clock ticking steadily towards midnight, this wedding would be accomplished, whether through tears or fighting.

I’d tried to speak to her, hoping that the little I’d managed to learn from the Brother would help put her at ease, but… it was because I had gone deeper into the fiend, allowing my body to warp into even more monstrous proportions. She would never look at me and see anything close to the vampires around us.

She could only see the beast.

I lowered my hands, staring at the ground, wishing I had kept the words to myself. Perhaps I had signed something terrible to her, or had mangled her language so badly she was ashamed that I had even tried.

The silence between us was broken only by Cirrien’s soft breaths as she cried, and the faint chirp and trill of crickets.

Ancestors help me. Any progress I had made with the journal—if I’d made any at all—was now destroyed.

“Well, let’s get on with it then, shall we?” Visca said, forced cheer in her tone. “Who’s got the cup?”

Cirrien surreptitiously wiped her face with her hands, but the tears still flowed freely. I watched her sidelong as Wyn stepped up to the altar, producing a large iron goblet set with chips of ruby, and one of her trusted maids poured wine into it from a silver ewer.

Visca took the maid’s place next, releasing a handful of crushed bloodrose petals into the wine. I knew that Wyn had cut bloodroses from her and Visca’s own wedding brambles for this, hoping the strength of their union would help aid ours.

She moved to hand it to the fragile human in our midst, but Wyn stopped her.

“She must say the vows in whatever way she can,” my advisor said softly, and Visca nodded, keeping the goblet for herself.

Wyn inhaled, her eyes on my bride.

“Cirrien lai Darran. You come before Mother Blood, the first ancestor, to give yourself, body, blood, and soul, to this vampire before you. Will you have him?”

Cirrien straightened, the spill of hair down her back as red as the petals in our wine, every line of her body limned silver in the moonlight. It was nearly impossible to keep my gaze away from the slim form wrapped in spidersilk, but… for her sake, I couldn’t slaver over her like a starving wolf.

She lifted her chin, tears glittering like diamonds, and signed with strong, confident motions. An affirmative.

My muscles relaxed infinitesimally, tension leaking from my shoulders.

Despite the cadre around us, the determination of my commander and advisor, I had half feared she would break and say no. Or worse, try to flee the Bloodgarden, and have to be dragged back and restrained.

“Will you protect him with your life? Will you offer your heart freely? Do you accept his aegis over your body?”

Yes, she signed, one of the few I recognized. Yes and yes.

The words had been adapted slightly for her sake. Ordinarily the vows would ask her to take my blood as hers, but that was one point on which I steadfastly refused.

She would not become a vampire merely for drinking my blood, but I would not prolong her life with me unnecessarily. She would have a hope of freedom in the end—the freedom of death, the shackles of marriage unlocked in the afterlife.

“When you stand before your ancestors and your soul is weighed, will you claim him as yours?”

Yes, Cirrien said, and added something else with punctuated ferocity. Wyn tipped her head slightly, but didn’t seem to take issue with the addition.

“Very well. Visca, give her a taste of the hardships to come. There is no love without pain.”

My commander stepped forth, holding a length of freshly-cut thorny vine from the Bloodgarden’s roses. The sharp scent of its sap almost overpowered the perfume of the flowers as Visca quietly ordered Cirrien to hold her hands together before herself and wrapped them with the vine.

The thorns dug into that smooth skin, drawing drops of blood that made my mouth water. Cirrien inhaled sharply, but she didn’t pull away.

Wyn’s sharp blue eyes landed on me.

“Lord Bane Lifegiver. You come before Mother Blood, your first ancestor, to give yourself body, blood, and soul to the woman before you. Will you have her?”

“Yes.” My voice emerged in a low growl, and I made myself look into those teary green eyes as I made my vows. I would look her in the eye as I bound her to me for life. “A thousand times, yes.”

Wyn asked the same questions, and I answered yes to every one, meaning them with every fiber of my being. Cirrien was mine now, whether she wanted it or not, and every fragment of what I was would defend her to my dying breath.

“When you stand before your ancestors and your soul is weighed, will you claim her as yours?”

Cirrien’s eyes were so bright. I couldn’t read the horror in them, and wondered if I had misread, but… no. I couldn’t be mistaken, not when her tears had poured so freely.

We might be vowed to each other. I might want her with the intensity of a beast, but I would not force myself onto her if she wanted nothing to do with me. I would simply want from afar, and that would have to be good enough.

“Every part of her. My soul would be nothing without hers,” I said roughly, and a frisson of surprise ran through me when she smiled faintly.

What did that mean?

“Visca, give him a taste of the pain the future holds. There is no love greater than that which weathers the storms.”

I held my hands out, my newly-blunted fingertips nearly touching Cirrien’s, and Visca wrapped me with the other end of the vine. The thorns dug in as she tightened the bond around us, our blood spilling on the same length, which would be buried in this garden.

Wyn finally handed the goblet to Cirrien, who held it awkwardly, rivulets of red spilling over her pale fingers from the thorn-pricks.

“Drink of this cup, blessed by the ones who came before, and bind yourself to this vampire.”

I watched my bride raise it to her lips, the column of her throat working as she took a deep draught. Purely wine and petals for her—if she were a vampire, or were she to choose an eternal life with me, the cup would have been held beneath our thorn-bonded hands to catch our intermingled blood.

Wyn slid a bottle from her robes, full of fresh blood that was nearly black in the moonlight. As Cirrien swallowed her wine, she uncorked it and poured it in, the sweet salt aroma of Cirrien’s fresh blood overpowering the roses.

“Now, Lord Bane, drink from this cup, blessed by the ones who came before, and bind yourself to this woman. She lives in you now, the other half of your soul.”

Cirrien’s eyes narrowed faintly at the words she hadn’t received, and if I understood anything about her at all, she already knew much of the ceremony had been changed for her sake.

I took the goblet and drank deeply, my first taste of Cirrien.

It was not the same as fresh blood from the vein, but it was sweet. The wine was an unwelcome addition, diluting the fresh taste of my bride, warmth soothing my aching throat.

Wyn took the goblet from me and held it beneath the thorns now, catching droplets in our mingled blood in the dregs of the wine. She swirled it, mixing them together, and then paused.

It was only a second of hesitation, one that perhaps no one outside of those who knew her well would even notice. But for the next part… I wondered if she was worried.

“Two are now one. You have vowed yourselves to each other, through life and into death; you will never be parted. We ask you now, Mother, to bestow your blessing upon this union.”

Wyn poured the wine-and-blood dregs into the mouth of the statue. It was only a few mouthfuls at most, the thin red liquid dripping over the white marble fangs of the Mother’s likeness, disappearing into her dark throat.

Cirrien stood so close to me, still bound by the thorns, that I felt her muscles tense. Her breath caught and held, her eyes fixed on the altar’s statue.

There was silence for a long moment, and then, in a silent, almost eerie waterfall, blood flowed from the Mother’s mouth, pouring over her white neck, filling her cupped hands in a dark pool.

Cirrien stared into the pooled blood, her eyes wide as it soaked into the pale marble, staining it red.

Wyn let out an audible sigh of relief. “This union is blessed. May the Lord and Lady of the Rift rule with the strength of iron for all their days.”

My cadre bowed before us, their own relief evident. A smothering hand of unease seemed to vanish, the Bloodgarden itself lightening around us.

“Now let the binding be planted, that their love and power might flourish so long as Ravenscry stands.”

Visca unbound our hands, coiling the bloodied thorn vine into a perfect spiral, and she handed it to Cirrien. “May the Lady plant it.”

We were ushered from the Mother’s altar, to a small, bare patch of ground in the garden at the base of one of the loggia’s columns. Someone had already dug a hole on Wyn’s orders; Cirrien knelt to lower the spiral into the ground.

“May the Lord bury it,” Wyn intoned, her voice much more relaxed now that the vows were made in time, and the union blessed. I hadn’t realized just how deeply worried she was until I heard her usual tones once more.

I knelt at Cirrien’s side, pushing soft, rich earth over the vine and patting it smooth.

Cirrien glanced up at me from under her lashes. Did she regret this?

“If this grows to become bloodroses, our marriage is doubly-blessed,” I said quietly. “If it withers… well. That’s never considered good luck.”

She signed something, then smiled and patted the back of my hand.

She touched me. Willingly.

I stared at my hand, where dirt had mixed with blood, where her fingers had left a smudged print.

A twisted urge rose up inside me, some perverse imp taking the reins—hadn’t I just sworn to myself not to make her life harder? To inflict myself upon her as little as possible?

But I couldn’t stop myself. I offered my hand, for a single moment pretending to be a man, a handsome vampire, instead of a fiend. “There will be a small celebration. Would you… accompany me?”

Cirrien looked down, contemplating her dirty, bloodied hands, clenching those fine-boned fingers.

I began to draw my hand away, already cursing myself for offering.

This was not a happy wedding. It was a necessity. Of course she wouldn’t wish to hang on my arm and pretend to be a blissfully-wedded wife.

But she signed something, her movements abrupt, and drew my hand back. Slid her arm through mine, resting our palms together lightly.

Cirrien smiled up at me, raising her left hand and forming rapid symbols. It took my shocked brain a moment to catch up—the Brother had formed these same signs, though I remembered little of them.

She was spelling words individually, each sign a letter.

Ancestors, why had I not been born with an eidetic memory? It suddenly seemed like a fatal flaw in my basic genetic components.

“I’m sorry, Cirrien, I’ve only just begun learning—” I muttered, but she didn’t appear disappointed.

She shook her head, touched my hand again, and then unleashed another single-handed flurry of letters, still smiling.

As long as my bride was smiling… I was happy. No, more than happy; purely ecstatic, because it was so much more than I could have hoped for.

“Soon I will learn it all, and your words will be no secret from me,” I told her. I helped her to her feet, trying to keep my gaze away from the dress clinging around her hips.

What curse was coming? Nobody ever got everything they didn’t dare wish for. She was lovely, determined, and composed. She was smiling. Touching me of her own accord.

There was a curse waiting in here somewhere. I just knew it.

“Let’s get the celebration going,” Visca interrupted, her own smile far more broad and satisfied than the ones that had come before. I’d even go so far as to say smug. “They’re going to want to take word of this down through the Rift, let everyone know they can stop worrying, their bachelor Lord has finally amended his ways.”

“They weren’t worried.” I guided Cirrien through the darkened garden, watching as several rose petals drifted from above and landed in her hair. I admired the velvet of them against the silk of her hair; I couldn’t bring myself to remove them. She wore them like a crown, almost vampiric with that pale skin in the moonlight.

Visca’s second in command, a large vampire named Koryek, kept a close step behind us. I had noticed his blue eyes on Cirrien, and now it took a tight hand on my leash to stop myself from doing something monumentally idiotic.

He was permitted to look. She was now his Lady, after all.

“My apologies, but I’d beg to differ, my Lord,” he said, his deep voice a rumble in the darkness. He smiled at Cirrien as she glanced at him, and I flexed my claws at my side. It would not endear me to her if I killed a man for smiling. “Your late wedding has been the main topic of discussion for about the last three months. They’ve been dying to know who their Lady will be.”

“Our reign is cemented now,” Wyn added. “Honestly, Bane, let’s not be ridiculous. The Rift-kin would revolt at this point if they tried to put a human back in Ravenscry.”

I pondered this as we left the Bloodgarden, the candlelight within the keep painting Cirrien in shades of gold. The taste of her blood still haunted me; I had to keep my eyes anywhere but that smooth expanse of throat and the swell of her breasts beneath it.

I forced my mind to the conversation at hand, not thinking about staining that white silk with red, not thinking about peeling it off her.

It was true that the Rift-kin were quite comfortable with us now. If anything, the valley had prospered under Visca’s protection and Wyn’s constant efforts to use her bloodwitchery for the good of the people.

“Well now, potential mutiny and celebrations aside, we’ve got some other points that need to be taken care of.” Visca nodded to Cirrien. “Like the protection detail for Lady Cirrien, since I should return to Heartsfjord soon and get those new legions trained up properly. But Koryek here would be a good fit for the captain of her guard.”

The vampire knight wore a cocky smirk on his chiseled face.

The last thing I wanted was handsome Koryek guarding Cirrien’s door day and night. Ancestors, I should have bought her a different book, one that was a little less detailed on the endless virtues of the non-fiend vampire.

However, saying no would make me look like a pathetic wet sack in the eyes of my lovely wife. I didn’t think the sharp intelligence behind those eyes would miss my jealousy.

“Cirrien may have whomever she pleases as her guards,” I said, without clenching my fangs—truly a miracle.

Had it really been only two days ago that I’d believed my bride would be drowning in poppy dreams, and I’d been fully prepared to lock her in the tower with Koryek at her beck and call?

The ancestors laughed at me. I wanted her in my tower, in my chambers, in my bed… I wanted to be the sword between Cirrien and the wolves.

“Choose whomever you would like,” I told my wife. She had been listening intently, her arm still laced through mine, but had made no effort to speak. “Visca is indeed responsible for ensuring the new legions are well-trained, but any other vampire under my command is at your disposal. And… if you would prefer humans, many live here and would be honored to be your guardians, although I would prefer you select at least one vampire. We can smell the wargs much more clearly, you see.”

She gave me one of those glances, peeking up under those inexplicably dark lashes. Her hand moved quickly, spelling something indecipherable.

“The guard is tomorrow’s problem,” Wyn said blithely. “Don’t you fear, I’ve got an entire list of things to be taken care of that will likely consume the better part of this week, so you might as well go in there and have some wine and cake now before you’re utterly ravaged by responsibility.”

Cirrien gave her a dry look and signed incomprehensibly.

“Anyways, dear, the cake is for you and the other humans. Now that you’re lawfully wedded and the Accords have been met, you can meet them, of course. I don’t anticipate any bids for freedom now. You’ll simply be returned to us, and it would be rather embarrassing for you to be gathered up like a wayward child.”

Cirrien rolled her eyes and she signed sharply, exhaling in exasperation.

“I can guess very well what you’re upset about, but really, Cirrien dear, you must see it from our point of view. In fact, my wife would be pleased to tell you all about it.”

Visca eyeballed Wyn narrowly, but my advisor gave no sign that she noticed.

“And here we are, the grand ballroom. We haven’t had an excuse to use this room in ages, so do forgive my exuberance in the decorating…”

Wyn shoved open the double pair of ebony doors, revealing the ballroom with crystals glimmering overhead, the gleaming black floor, the endless wreaths of vines and roses.

And the crowd of mixed vampires and humans—the legion captains, the human minor nobility of the Rift, all come specifically to see the new Lady for themselves and witness the signed documents.

As Cirrien gazed at the sudden and unexpected crowd with wide eyes, Wyn stepped into the room with her arms held wide.

“The Accords have been honored! For ten long years we have waited, and now our hopes are fulfilled and our ambitions anchored. People of the Rift, welcome your Lady, Cirrien lai Darran, wife of Lord Bane Lifegiver.”

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