“Well informed indeed.” He pats my cheek. I want to jerk away, but I don’t. I have to keep him talking. I want all the answers.
“Yes, I figured if they inherited his curse, then maybe they inherited his power,” the old priest continues. “It was a great risk, but it was worth a try. My body, in the ugly form that you have seen it, was difficult to bear. I didn’t care much if I died in the process. So I climbed up to the monastery, sneaked inside, and attacked The Abbot—Lucian, you might have heard about him as well. Of all the monks, he was the most likely to have the power.
“So I provoked him just enough for him to spew his curse at me, then managed to flee. Like I said, it could have meant death, but what choice did I have? Live as the hideous creature you saw before, persecuted and plagued with all kinds of pain and aches, or risk big and win big.” He leans closer with his intense dark eyes. While he’s been talking, I lowered myself into the chair opposite from him. The daylight filtering through the window reveals his face clearly, the face of a normal man with an abnormal, fear-inducing stare.
“And win I did, Isolde.” Wicked satisfaction plays in his face. “With this new superpower, I drew up a plan. And you played the main part in it.”
“Me?”
“Thanks to you, I will finally see Lord Dracula and his men fall.”
The connections in my head fail. “What part can I possibly play for Lord Dracula? I’m just his extended family. I’m not personally important to him.”
He grabs my arm and grins satisfied.
“You’ll see how it all comes together. The die is cast, there’s no turning back.”
I try to yank myself from his grip, but he’s too strong. “I won’t play along, Old Priest. If you placed all your bets on me, it was a bad call.”
“Oh, it was the best call. You’ll play along, if you care about Father Ruben’s life.”
“Father Ruben.” My breath hitches, hot blood creeping up my neck to my face. “He is here?”
Tristan
I SPREAD A MAP OVER the table, under an oil lamp. It’s the map of the tunnel caves inside the mountain. They’re beautiful, a radiating octopus with many tentacles, carved inside the rock by Mother Nature.
I sense Soraya in the doorway behind me as I pore over them. I can smell her, and the hot tea she’s cradling in her white serpent hands. I can also feel her jealousy like acid on my back.
“How did it feel, seeing her again today?”
My jaw clenches. I refuse to respond, keeping my eyes on the map, but Soraya insists.
“Don’t pretend it was nothing, I saw the way you looked at her. Besides, for weeks you’ve tossed and turned, thinking about her.”
“I wasn’t thinking about her,” I throw over my shoulder. “I was making plans in my head, that’s why I was restless.”
“You don’t fool me, Tristan, or anyone else for that matter.” She comes close to my side so that I can see her bitter face. “Even that girl earlier today at the priest’s house could see how you stared at Isolde like she was a goddess.” There’s hurt in her voice at that last word. I angle my body to her, narrowing my eyes as new suspicions make their way into my head.
“Soraya, it’s not like you want to be with me because we’re in love. It’s a strategic alliance that you’re after, and Mark as well, we’re both aware of that. So why this hatred of Isolde and what I might feel for her? Why the jealousy?”
She smiles. “I thought you’d never ask.” She cradles the mug of tea in one hand and sinks the other into a pocket of her long black dress. She pulls out a familiar object, and current runs through my heart—the bottle with Madam Magda’s love potion.
Soraya huffs. “You should see your face, Prince of Spades. Expressing emotion again, stupefaction. You were hard and cold for too long, and now you can’t temper the expression of your feelings. You probably can’t temper them on the inside either.”
She steps so close that we’re now face to face. As a serpent woman, she’s very tall, only a few inches smaller than me.
“If I were to tell you that I’m going to enjoy watching Mark beating Isolde to a pulp when this is over, watching him kick her while she’s down, what would you feel, Tristan?”
My fists clench, and electricity breaks out in my irises. Soraya’s eyes search mine for answers, bitterness in her face, her long cheeks turning red with frustration.
“Fury mixed with a violent need to protect and avenge her,” she says. She holds up the small bottle with the golden cap. “On one of the nights you were out at the strip club with Mark, I went through your things. And this right here is what I discovered. I tasted it, took just a little bit, trying to identify the substance. I couldn’t tell at first, I even thought it was some fragrance you liked to use, and I put it right back to where I found it. But then Mark had me keep an eye on you, and I fell in lust. The feelings came quickly and intensified in a matter of days, and then I knew.”
She allows the feeling to finally show freely in her face. “Who was this love potion meant for, Tristan?”
The cat is out of the bag. I might as well tell her, and stand by it.
“It was meant for you and Mark. Falling in love with you was the only thing that would have determined Mark to let Isolde go, even though he’d made her his mate.”
“And when Mark forced you and that whiny little bitch to drink from those tumblers on that first night....”
I let her draw her own conclusions.
“You’re truly in love with her,” she whispers, revelation in her voice and in her face.
I raise my chin, eyes fixed on her face as I make the decision. Yes, I will tell her the full truth, and by telling it to her, I will admit it to myself.
“I don’t know if what I feel for her is love,” I begin. “But every time I think about her my heart fills with the sweetest sensation. I feel like a ravenous beast when I look at those rosy lips. I want to stick my cock in her and my fangs into her throat, drink from her, and spill my cum inside of her. I want to take her lifeblood into me and pour mine into her, possessing her, making her mine so no one can challenge my claim on her.”
“Good luck with that. She’s Mark’s mate, and nothing can change that,” she spews through her teeth.
I grin, baring my fangs, my irises turning sharp as blades. “Let him come and make that claim. I’ll torture him to death right in front of my sweet white dove, Isolde.”
Her lips tighten in a strained line, frustration reddening her eyes.
“But you know what’s the worst thing for me right now?” I continue, determined to turn the knife in her wound, just like she planned to turn it in Isolde’s. “That my sweet white dove thinks I’m with you because I wanted to. That I preferred you to her.” I snort. “As if that were even possible. How could a man ever want you, when he can have her? How could a man ever want a vicious, cruel creature like you, when he could have an angel like her.”
“She’s not as pure as you think,” she hisses. “She hates serpents, and she would watch you torture us with delight. How is she different from me?”