"Love At First Bite" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kenyon Sherrilyn, Banks L. A., Squires Susan, Thompson Ronda)

Chapter Six

How dare he?! Emma thought as she rattled the door-knob. He's locked me in!

She whirled and put her back against the door. She'd moved into the adjacent room at his insistence, because of the broken lock. Here she was, dressed in serviceable clothes and sensible half-boots, ready to go down and help him and his friends, and now he was trying to protect her from the ugliness of his life. She wouldn't have it.

She pushed off the door and went out onto the balcony. The sun was rising behind the city, for it created an answering glow out over the harbor, now empty of ships. We'll just see about that. She climbed up on the wooden chair and from there to the sidewall of the balcony. Don't look down. The gap isn't more than four feet. Hardly more than a step.

She held her breath and jumped, teetering on the wall of the balcony to her original room until she could grasp the striped awning and lower herself down. She dashed out through the broken door. Now to find her quarry. Where in the hotel would she be if she had just come in from battle? There were probably forty rooms here. No, not in a room. She'd be in the kitchens.

She went cautiously down the great staircase, then wended her way to the back from the lobby. She heard them before she saw them.

"Lord, Rufford, if reinforcements don't come soon…" Davie, sounding shocked.

"They'll come…" A weary baritone she recognized. She had stood up at his wedding to Beth Rochewell. Ian Rufford was here with Davie?

"Fedeyah, sit down. Drink this." Davie in his most commanding Major's voice.

"Enough! There is so little." An Arab accent. "Save some for Rufford and yourself."

She slid quietly toward an open doorway from which the voices came.

"I'll find more." This from Davie, but he wasn't sure. She could hear it in his voice.

"You can't go out in daylight." Mr. Rufford gasped for breath. "You'll fry."

"The city is deserted, except for them," the Arab muttered. "Unless Allah provides, we must do without."

Emma peered around the door frame. At first she couldn't quite take in what she was seeing. Davie stood over Mr. Rufford, who was laid out on one of the long wooden tables in the center of the kitchen. He cradled Mr. Rufford's head in one arm and was helping him to drink from a cup. Mr. Rufford's mouth was stained red, along with everything else. Blood was everywhere. Terrible wounds were revealed by the shredded clothing still clinging to Mr. Rufford. On the hearth of the great fireplace filled with spits and pots sat an Arab man with sad eyes, also wounded. The whole place smelled of blood. Shock and revulsion cascaded over her.

"I should never have left you to face them," Davie said, his voice soaked in guilt.

Mr. Rufford put up a hand and looked around. How was he still breathing? "Come in, my dear Miss Fairfield," he said hoarsely.

Davie swung round. The Arab looked up. She sighed and stepped out into the doorway.

"Miss Fairfield! Get back to your room!" Davie cried, laying Rufford back onto the table. He strode across to her and took her shoulders.

"Miss Fairfield"? "Get back to your room"? "As you recall, Major Ware, as soon as you can find a minister, it will be Emma Ware. And I told you when I accepted your proposal to share your life last night that I share it all, whether you like it or not." She looked to the other men. She was about to ask how she could help when a cut across Mr. Rufford's forehead sealed itself before her very eyes. She gasped. What is going on here ? Davie tried to turn her about and hustle her from the room, but she pulled out of his grasp. She glanced across to the Arab. The pink weal of a scar slowly disappeared from his cheek.

"What are you?" she whispered to Mr. Rufford, ignoring Davie's sputtering protests.

"Don't tell her," Davie warned.

"We are not like you, Miss Fairfield," Mr. Rufford said, getting up to one elbow. "Not anymore." A sword wound on his chest began to close.

She swallowed and tried to breathe. "I see that." She turned to Davie. "You might as well tell me."

He looked away, ashamed.

"Perhaps it would be easier if I tell you, Miss Fairfield. I'll be stronger in a bit." Mr. Rufford lay back, obviously exhausted.

She wanted to know now. Davie was leaning against the window frame as though defeated. She turned to the Arab. "You tell me."

The Arab glanced to Davie. "We have a thing in our blood, miss. It changes us."

"How?" She crossed the room to him, slowly. "How does it change you?"

"We are strong. We heal and live long. Sunlight is painful. We can move unseen."

Davie turned from the window, his expression fierce. "I don't think you're doing it justice, Fedeyah. It's a disease, Emma. We're vampire. We're immortal unless we're decapitated, and we drink human blood. No way around that. And Fedeyah forgot to mention the fact that we can compel weaker minds. We can make people do things they don't want to do."

They were vampire? The word echoed in her mind with horrible reverberations.

"God in heaven," Davie continued, rolling his head, "we can't even commit suicide! Rufford knows; he tried often enough. We're monsters, Emma, once we're infected. Monsters." This last was said on a note of such despair, her heart went out to him.

She stood, blinking stupidly, wondering what to do, what to think. Vampire, human blood, immortality. And Davie, her Davie, was condemned to this? She glanced to Rufford, who seemed only half-sensible, his wounds slowly resolving themselves. The red trickling from the corner of his mouth was human blood. How could she think that so calmly?

"Who did you kill tonight?" It was as though someone else asked the question.

"Others of our kind, made by an evil woman. Not pretty." Davie's mouth was grim.

Decapitation. She would wager it wasn't pretty.

"They want to rule the world," the Arab said. His voice grew incredibly sad. "They make more vampires. It would destroy the balance. We make jihad against them."

"Balance? What balance?"

"We do not kill humans for our blood," Fedeyah explained. "We don't make others of our kind. There are Rules. Rules they do not obey."

"And these Rules wouldn't condone marriage to a woman who isn't like you, would they?" She turned to Davie. Anger boiled up out of her belly uncontrolled. Davie drank human blood and was going to live forever unless he was killed in some horrible way fighting a war against monsters like him. "You knew that last night. And you let me think we could be happy together." Tears sprang from nowhere.

"Go back to your room, Miss Fairfield," Davie said. His voice was distant. He turned back to the window.

She whirled and ran down the corridor and up to her room. The damned door was locked, so she went into her original room and pushed the door back into its frame, no matter how silly that was. She couldn't lock out the creatures downstairs. With their strength they would just push through an unlocked door or a locked one. She remembered how Davie had burst into the room. She threw herself on the bed, sobbing, because all her innocence was lost and all her future, and the world held monsters and one of them was Davie.

She came out of a sleep feeling drugged and groggy. It was twilight. The sky outside the window was purple, edging into indigo. Someone was knocking at the door.

"Miss Fairfield?"

One of the monsters, she thought dully. Mr. Rufford. "Come in." What did it matter?

He pushed the door in gingerly. He was clean, shaved, no blood in sight. He wore a shirt open at the neck, black trousers, and riding boots to the knee. His brown, curling hair was tied back in a ribbon, just as it had been in St. James's Church when he had married Miss Rochewell. Hmmm. Emma thought about that.

He made a small bow. "Are you well? I thought you might be hungry." She got up on one elbow. He carried a plate: cold roast beef, horseradish, some radishes and small tomatoes, a chunk of bread. She was famished. How could her body betray her emotions so? Without waiting for an answer, he set the plate down on the table beside the bed. She sat up and touched her hair. "You look fine." He hesitated, looking as though he thought he should go but wanted to stay.

She didn't want him to go, she decided. In the shock of the moment in the kitchen, she hadn't realized what to ask. Now she did. "Won't you sit down?" she asked, gesturing to a chair.

He hesitated, then sat.

Emma's mind churned. She thought back to the wedding. "Miss Rochewell, I mean Mrs. Rufford…" She frowned. "Where is she now?"

"She serves the cause in Tripoli." The grimace around his mouth said he didn't like it. That was interesting, though. Beth Rufford was allowed to help the cause.

"Did she know?"

His blue eyes looked up sharply. "When she married me? Yes. A tribute to her courage."

Miss Rochewell had accepted that Mr. Rufford was vampire? How could she? Still… Emma sorted through what she knew. Drinking human blood—bad, but as long as they didn't kill… How could she be thinking that? Strong—that was fine. Compelling people against their will—bad again, but a good man could refrain, couldn't he? It occurred to her that compulsion might be one way a woman could hurt a man during sex. She wondered how Davie had been "infected" and whether it had anything to do with the evil woman who made vampires. And yet the most important thing Emma wanted to know might only be answered by this vampire sitting across from her who had married a mortal woman. "How… how does she bear the fact that she is mortal and you are not?" In some ways it came down to that.

Mr. Rufford took a breath. "She doesn't have to. She isn't mortal anymore."

Emma felt her eyes get big.

"As I said, she has courage." He looked fond and… proud. He shot her another sharp glance. "Beth and I accept who we are. More than accept. I can't explain. Major Ware may accept someday. I hope so. I promised to kill him if he demanded it. I hope I won't have to keep that promise." Mr. Rufford rose. "Eat. Keep up your strength. We must go soon. The jihad calls."

"Wait! How… how is one infected? How was Davie infected?"

"The blood from one of us must be ingested, or introduced through a cut. Major Ware came to serve our cause here in Casablanca as a human. It was an incredible thing to ask of him, but we needed someone who could go about in daylight. He was infected while he defended Fedeyah and me."

"How… did he get the scars I saw on his body?" She felt herself flush.

"Asharti." Mr. Rufford set his mouth. "She made the army we fight. We have all suffered at her hands." He nodded curtly, his confidences at an end. "Stay in tonight. The streets will not be safe." He slid out quietly.

Emma took up the plate and absently crunched a radish. Davie thought he was a monster. But Rufford didn't. He loved his wife. They had accepted… more than accepted that they were vampire. What did that mean?

Emma rolled up a slice of beef and dipped it in horseradish. Where else could one get beef and horseradish but in an English hotel, even on the other side of the world? English people always took who they were along with them. A fault perhaps. But therein lay a truth. Didn't one always take oneself along no matter how strange the destination? Were she and Davie any different at heart than they were yesterday? Mrs. Rufford joined her husband even when she knew the truth about him. Mr. Rufford must have made her vampire in spite of these Rules or whatever, they were, and he loved her, and…

And what?

And that changed everything.

Emma stared at the whitewashed walls of the room, painted crimson with the last of the dying sun. She was strangely aware of her lungs pushing air in and out of her chest, her heart thudding. The decision that rattled in her brain demanding to be made frightened her.

She had thought she was a rebel because she refused to marry someone she didn't love. True rebellion was deeper than that. She thought she was bold chasing after Davie to Casablanca. She didn't know then what "bold" meant. Now she would find out what she was made of. She was at the extreme edge of experience, and yet there was one more step to take. She had wanted to cross some line that would cut off all retreat to her humdrum life in England by giving up her virginity. Now she knew that wasn't a bold enough line.

The sky was lightening out the window of the hotel kitchen. Emma was ready for the return of the warriors. Could she face the kind of wounds she had seen yesterday morning? Could she bear to see Davie hurt? No time for those thoughts now. She had hot food prepared, a hearty lamb stew. She had ripped up some hotel sheets for bandages, though she wasn't certain they would be useful. One thing she knew they'd need she didn't have. Blood.

Or maybe she did.

Crashing sounded from the front lobby. Looters? The hotel had been deserted all day. Or maybe it was Davie coming back. She picked up a butcher's knife and ran to the front.

A ragged man knelt before two others, sobbing, pleading in Arabic. She might not understand the words, but she understood his horrified expression. He knew his life hung in the balance. The scent of cinnamon filled the air. He had obviously tried to take refuge in the hotel. Unsuccessfully. At her appearance his two persecutors swung around. A wicked grin stole over the face of the taller one. He saluted her. Both intruders had an avaricious gleam in their eyes. The stouter one turned back to the sobbing man. The one before her stalked forward two steps. His eyes turned red. There was no other word for it. And the grin on his face now included canines elongating into fangs. Panic soaked her. She had to run!

But she didn't. She walked forward though she knew she shouldn't, even though she was afraid. She struggled against the impulse, but still she took step after step, her chest heaving with useless resistance until she could feel his reeking breath, hot on her face. Behind her nemesis she heard a very human shriek, then a horrible burbling sound. She thought she might be going to pass out, because there was a whirling blackness just at the edge of her vision. The creature held her close. Red eyes filled her vision. She prayed to faint. The creature wrenched away from her and she fell to the floor. Above her, Davie shouted like a berserker as he slashed at her attacker.

Still dazed, she saw that Davie was already wounded in a dozen places. And there was Mr. Rufford. How was he still standing? But they were, fighting the two attackers. On the floor near the door was the ragged man, his throat ripped out The scene taking place around her seemed unreal, it was so horrific. Emma heard Davie's grunt as a blade found him, a shriek of anguish as Rufford felled one. She felt the splatter of warm liquid and blinked when a head rolled past her.

It was over. The lobby seemed strewn with body parts. Davie sank to his knees in the gore. Mr. Rufford wavered on his feet but went to help him. A whirling darkness dissipated in the corner and Fedeyah stepped out of it. She was beyond surprise.

Fedeyah came to help her up. "We have rats in the house," he observed. "That makes forty." She saw that she was still gripping the silly butcher's knife. She let it clatter to the floor.

This? This was what they had been facing every night?

Mr. Rufford pulled Davie's arm over his shoulder. "To the kitchens."

Emma trailed in their wake, still blinking. They staggered into a kitchen, filled with the smell of spiced lamb stew and her neat rows of rolled bandages. Fedeyah sank on the raised hearth. Mr. Rufford heaved Davie up on the huge wooden table and then simply sank to the floor, his back against a table leg. Davie didn't move.

"What, what can I do for you?" she asked faintly. Her rolled bandages seemed ludicrous.

"Blood," Mr. Rufford breathed.

She felt her own blood rush from her face.

"No, no." Rufford shook his head wearily. "Not from you. From the dead man by the door. It must be from the human."

She swallowed. Very well. She grabbed an intricately painted terra-cotta bowl and turned to face the lobby. She kept her mind tight, small. Step. Step. Step. Survey the room. Find the ragged man. Did the ragged tear in his throat still bleed? Yes. Step. Step. Kneel. Hold the bowl. Keep your mind a blank. Don't look at his opaque eyes. Keep your stomach clenched. The flow slowed to a drip. Look at the bowl. Not full. Survey the room. Blood everywhere. But not human. This is all the human blood. Is it enough? Stand. Wait for the room to steady. Step. Step. Step. Careful with the bowl.

She fell to her knees in the hallway and vomited onto the tiles. But she didn't spill the precious bowl. Then she staggered up. Push into the kitchen. Kneel in front of Mr. Rufford. "Is it enough?"

She saw the answer in his look. "Give it to Fedeyah and Ware. I'll do."

Now was the moment. "I'll take care of Major Ware," she whispered, and offered the bowl to Mr. Rufford.

He peered at her through exhausted eyes. A small smile curved his lips. He nodded, took the bowl, and gulped his half. The gray in his complexion faded. "I told him he was a lucky dog."

She chewed her lips and glanced to Davie. "This doesn't seem lucky."

"It will, if we can prevail against the tide."

"I hope you're right." She took the bowl to Fedeyah, who drank the balance. Both he and Mr. Rufford were healing faster. Only Davie remained still and bleeding. She glanced to Rufford. "How… how do I do this? Must I cut myself?" She hoped she had the courage.

To her surprise, Rufford pushed himself up and looked around. Then he pulled Davie from the table, hefted his limp form across his shoulders, and staggered to a little storeroom off the main kitchen. There he laid Davie down across some sacks of flour. "Gently," Mr. Rufford said. "Lie by his side. He will know what to do." He stumbled from the room.

Emma looked around and saw a flint and candle. She lit the candle and shut the door. The smell of flour and dried beans was overwhelmed by the cinnamon scent of Davie and the smell of blood. She swallowed. No time to lose the courage of your convictions. Davie needed her. And if what he needed wasn't just in the ordinary line of mending handkerchiefs and hosting his dinner parties, well, that was just what she had escaped London to avoid.

She tried not to look at his wounds as she lay down. She was dimly aware that he had cuts and gouges over much of his body. His clothes were in tatters. He'll heal, she told herself. Just like Rufford and Fedeyah. She pressed herself to his side and felt the warmth there. She brushed the hair back from his forehead. There was a gash on his cheek that didn't seem to be healing at all and one on his shoulder, peeking through his torn shirt. "Davie," she whispered. His eyelids fluttered. "Davie, wake up and take what you need."

The blue eyes opened, struggled to focus. Then he turned to her. "You shouldn't be here, Emma," he whispered. "You shouldn't have seen—"

"This is exactly where I should be," she corrected. She tried to keep fear from knocking against her ribs as she saw his eyes flicker red.

"No," he gasped in a strangled sob. His eyes faded to blue. He wrenched his head to the side. "I'm a beast, Emma."

She reached to his jaw and gently turned him back to face her. "You're my Davie. I'm your Emma. Nothing has changed. I want you, Vernon Davis Ware. And I'm not going to give you up just because you're immortal and strong. Or over the blood. Miss Rochewell didn't give up Rufford."

"You don't know—"

"But I do. Surely nothing can be worse than tonight."

"One mortal, one not…" He shook his head ever so slightly.

She left that for later, just put up her chin and bared her throat to him.

His eyes began to glow faintly red. "I can't take from you…" This was a desperate sob.

"You're not taking, my love. I'm giving. It's different." She stroked his jawline as his eyes went fully red. Would he growl as those in the lobby had? Would he rip her throat?

Instead he kissed her, gently. His lips brushed her chin, her jaw. "I don't deserve you," he murmured. Then he kissed her throat. She forced her shoulders to relax. She stretched her head back, waiting. But he continued to kiss her so softly, so tenderly, that she began to feel the wet between her legs. She remembered yesterday, making love through the sunlight hours, sweet pleasure rolling through her again and again at Davie's touch. And when the twin points of pain finally came, they were all mixed up for her in lovemaking. Davie filled all her senses, even pain. She moaned as he clasped her to his body and sucked rhythmically.

"Ahhh, Davie, Davie," she murmured, and held his head against her throat. The pain was over. All that remained was the sensation of being one with him, possessed. The throb of her heart was meant to push her blood into his mouth. The great artery in her throat was meant to be opened by him. Her hips began to move of their own accord as they rocked together. And then there came a feeling of… distance, as if she were floating away on the tide of their passionate exchange. She relaxed into his arms.

The moment she went limp, he wrenched away with a cry. "Emma, Emma, did I take too much? God, what have I done?"

She looked up at him, sleepy. "No. That was… exciting." She noticed that the wound on his cheek was closed. That brought her up sharply. She shook off her lethargy and examined him, as he hung over her. If she didn't bestir herself it would be too late. But no, the wound on his shoulder was still open and seeping. She raised herself on one elbow and pushed him firmly onto his back. He looked surprised. Then she bent her head, pulled back his tattered shirt, and, taking only one breath for courage, licked his wound.

The taste of his blood was copper, thick. Not unpleasant. She licked again, just to make sure she got enough. The wound closed under her lips.

He gripped her shoulders, his glare fierce. "What have you done?" he cried.

She looked at him calmly, more calmly than her thumping heart might indicate. "I have fulfilled a vow. For better or for worse."

"You don't know!" He sat up. With the strength lent by her blood, his wounds were disappearing quickly. "You'll die without the immunity of a vampire's blood…"

"How lucky that I know a vampire. You won't let the Rules stand in the way of my immunity, will you, Davie?"

"Emma." His eyes filled. "I will likely die tonight, Emma. We can't hold them. Forty we killed tonight and still they come and come. You'll be left alone to die horribly."

"We both could die tonight, Davie. Or any other night. One just can't know the future."

"You don't know what you're in for. You can't."

"Probably neither of us do." She smiled ruefully. "But we'll face it together."

He grabbed her, shook her until she thought her teeth would rattle, and then took her in a fierce embrace. She could hear him trying to suppress the sobs in his chest. There. That was better. "I wanted to protect you."

"Do your best, Davie. I permit you to protect me from anything but you."

"I never wanted this for you."

"And what I want, does that not count? We are a partnership." It was her turn to disengage herself and hold him away from her. "An equal partnership."

"Woman!" he half-laughed, though his cheeks were wet.

"See?" She smiled. "You didn't know what you were getting into with me, either." She sobered as a flaming sensation coursed along her veins. "Mr. Rufford may not be happy over what I've done. And you must wait to give me immunity. You can't be weakened with the odds so great." Suddenly things she hadn't anticipated came rushing in. She felt her eyes go big. Now was not the time for her to become ill and be a burden on him.

He rose and handed her up off the flour sacks, his mouth a grim line. "Just let Rufford try to hinder us. Let us see how he and Fedeyah go on. They didn't have blood tonight."

She followed him, dousing the candle. "They did have blood. I collected a bowlful from that man in the lobby, the one who wasn't vampire. Or what was left of him."

He turned a shocked countenance on her. "You… ?"

"I managed." She didn't tell him she had vomited.

He chuffed a laugh and took her hand. Rufford was sitting at the table in front of the hearth, tucking into a bowl of the stew. Fedeyah was pouring wine. He handed Davie a glass. Their wounds were hardly more than scars.

"Miss Fairfield?" Fedeyah asked, waving a full glass of wine. "You look pale."

"Thank you." She nodded.

"She needs blood, Rufford," Davie said, without preamble. His voice had iron in it.

"I thought she might," Rufford remarked. "Excellent stew, Miss Fairfield. We are not used to such expertise in the kitchen. Or should I call you Mrs. Ware?"

"That can wait until we find a Christian minister," she said, suddenly shy. The room was doing funny things around the edges.

Mr. Rufford peered at her. "Take her upstairs where she can be comfortable, Ware."

"I mean to give her what she needs." Davie said it as a threat, a promise. Emma smiled. He had decided.

"My blood will do the job faster. I'll send up a cup later. Between us we can muster enough to make her way easier than yours was."

"My blood is hers," Fedeyah said from somewhere far away.

Emma felt her knees grow wobbly as the fire in her veins raced up toward her heart. She wanted to thank them, to apologize for being so much trouble… but she couldn't seem to make her mouth work. Then Davie swept her up in his arms. She felt his heart beating against her breast…

Night. Blessed darkness! Moonlight shone in through shutters thrown wide to the night air. She was alive! She touched the wool of a fine red robe she had been wrapped in. She could feel each individual thread in it The scent of jasmine drifted in through the window. How had she never noticed how wonderful jasmine smelled? Joyful life flowed through her veins… she felt… more than she had ever been. Where was Davie? She must tell him how wonderful she felt.

She heard noise in the street below. She threw off the covers. How long had she lain here? She remembered Davie sitting with her, Davie making her drink the thick, sweet copper-flavored blood drained from his wrist or sent up from Rufford and Fedeyah. The pain had been dreadful, but always Davie was there to soothe her…

She leaned out of the window. In the street below, Davie, Rufford, and Fedeyah stood, backs together, sabers drawn, and in a semicircle around them stood what? Fifty? A hundred? Eyes glowed red on both sides. She stifled a cry.

"Strategic retreat, Ware?" Rufford whispered. She heard him clearly, though.

"What use?" Davie answered, iron resolve in his voice.

"Very well. The last stand against chaos starts here." Rufford straightened.

Lord, God, if such as I am now may pray to you, then help them! she thought.

But dash it all, she dared not leave it only to God. Strength rushed through her. She would not again stand by stunned while they fought for their lives as she had in the lobby that first night. She whirled from the window and hurried down the stairs. The lobby had been cleared of corpses. Her bare feet slapped against the cool tile. Over the fireplace in the lobby hung a display of crossed swords. No paltry butcher's knife for her tonight. She climbed on the hearth and stood on tiptoe. If Davie was going to die tonight in some gesture of sacrifice and duty, no matter how futile, then so would she.

She had a moment of doubt as she reached for the heavy weapon. She was only a woman. But she hefted the sword easily. She was that strong! She didn't stop to wonder. The red robe she wore was a native burnoose, richly embroidered at the edges, much better than her English dress for moving about in. She raised her sword and ran for the street. She had no skill with such a weapon. But that was not the point, was it?

The three men standing in a semicircle against the hordes glanced back. Rufford smiled. Fedeyah touched his forehead once. And Davie, about to protest, closed his mouth firmly over whatever he would have said. She took her place beside him.

He looked down at her with such love in his eyes that the thing inside her welled up and shouted gladness. Life seemed to hum in her veins. But there was no time to tell him. Movement made her glance out at their enemies. The wall of red eyes ahead advanced. Who were these men? Why were they here? Only what they wanted was plain. They wanted the four before them dead. Fedeyah and Rufford spread out to give themselves room to swing their swords.

"Decapitation is the only way," Davie whispered, his eyes hard. "It's difficult. Aim for the neck. I'll finish them."

Emma swallowed. Killing people? Had she thought this through? Even such creatures as these? But what choice was there?

At that moment, a heavy man in the center let out a piercing ululation, and the line broke into a melee of bodies as they charged forward. This was it, the doomed last stand against chaos.

Emma hefted the sword with both hands. Davie stepped in front of her, slashing. A body launched itself into the air from the side. Emma held her sword out, frightened. The body was impaled upon it, wrenching it from her grip. She shrieked in horror. But then the creature stood. He slashed at her. A cut opened on her shoulder. She gripped the hilt of her sword where it protruded from the creature's breast and pulled. Davie slashed at the vampire's neck. She didn't think anything happened, but the creature fell back. She pulled her sword back with both hands and slashed at the neck of an oncoming boy, even as horror shrieked inside her. The blade thunked against something. A horrible cut opened up, but the boy raised his sword. Davie cut at three others now descending. Shadows cascaded behind them. There were too many. Rufford fought like a slashing demon. Too many!

In the center of the melee, whirling darkness spread, obscuring even the closest of figures. Emma just pushed the young boy vampire with the glowing eyes and blood spurting from the cut she'd made back into the crowd. The darkness was everywhere, in among them. Had she not seen that strange kind of darkness before? A cutlass found Davie, and another vampire was twisting Davie's head. Emma slashed at those arms furiously. The attacker fell away, howling. A hand grasped her shoulder. She turned. Another young man hardly out of his teens hissed at her, brandishing a knife. She pulled away.

Time slowed as combatants on both sides took in a new reality. The darkness was seeping into the earth, it seemed. And taking its place, standing among the attackers, still like statues, were perhaps twenty men and women, some dressed as monks, some in rich garb from many nations. The stillness lasted but a moment. They began to move almost faster than the eye could comprehend, rending, slashing at the hordes. And their eyes glowed red.

"How did you hold out?" a tall man with luxuriant mustachios asked. Emma sat in a corner just behind Ian Rufford, hoping not to be noticed. The power careening around the room was intimidating. Energy vibrated in different notes and tones. Davie had taken several of the newcomers upstairs to bathe and dress, but perhaps fifteen of the victorious were arrayed around the grand dining room in various states of dishevelment. Wounds were healed and now a cold collation and the hotel cellar's finest vintages were being consumed with relish by monks and noblemen alike. "Must have been the blood of the Old One that runs in your veins."

"We would not have held through tonight if you had not come." Rufford frowned into the dregs at the bottom of his glass.

Emma recognized the stunning woman with hair like banked coals who poured Rufford another glass of wine. Beatrix Lisse, Countess of Lente and toast of London's male society. It was disconcerting, no, stunning to discover that she had been vampire all along.

"Why so anxious, Rufford?" the Countess asked. "Asharti's army is broken."

"Here," he growled. "But there is still Tripoli."

"Ahhh," she said in recognition. "John sent word. Tripoli is secured. Your Beth is fine."

Rufford relaxed.

"We expected two of you. Yet we find four," the Countess observed, glancing at Emma.

Davie's new kind might not be welcoming to newly made vampires, since they had just spent some effort to eradicate an army of them. Emma tried to think what to do about that, but she was having trouble concentrating on the talk around her. Thoughts of Davie kept creeping into her mind and down lower to the point between her legs. The flood of life that coursed through her veins seemed to conjure thoughts of Davie, naked and needing. She wished he would return. But maybe that would only make it worse.

"Ironic, isn't it, Beatrix?" Rufford asked, twirling his glass. "Four made vampires, two actually by Asharti, were the only thing standing between Asharti's army and success." He said to Emma confidentially, "The Countess was my instructor in the ways of being vampire." Then he turned back to Beatrix Lisse. "You didn't mind using made vampires when it was the only chance you had to kill Asharti, did you?"

"Point taken," she conceded.

"And I called for Ware. He came, knowing exactly what he was up against. He kept us provisioned and provided logistics for nearly two months."

"Courageous fellow." There was still a tone of reserve in her voice. Emma could see that several of the others were listening.

"He got infected saving my life, Beatrix," Rufford said, his voice hard. "I couldn't let him die, any more than Fedeyah could let me die."

"And you?" the Countess asked Emma, with sweetness that Emma knew masked dangerous power. "What brought you all the way from England to a place like Casablanca?"

Emma lifted her chin. "I came to help Major Ware."

"She and I were betrothed." Davie came down the main staircase, himself washed and dressed. The coat didn't fit him exactly. It was probably "borrowed" from one of the departed hotel guests. But to her he had never looked better, more English, more hers. Now she recognized the vibrating intensity the Companion gave. The fact that Davie had just lied to save her face was dear. "She sacrificed as much as anyone for this cause. I made her vampire. Blame me."

Emma stood. She couldn't let Davie take responsibility for this. This was on her head. "No, he didn't, Countess. I couldn't gather enough human blood for all three of them. So I gave him my blood." Davie came to put his arm around her. She smiled at him, getting courage from his straight back. He was proud of her. She turned to the Countess. "And then I licked his wounds. I couldn't let his condition stand between us. In short, I did it for love. And you won't understand that, but it's the truth."

The Countess glanced to Rufford, uncertain.

"True," he remarked. "Of course you've never made anyone for love. John Staunton, Earl of Langley, for instance. Why, I'll wager he's always been vampire—"

Beatrix Lisse threw up her hands. "Ahhh! I can't police true love. The Elders must grow used to it." She poured wine into her own glass, frowning. "These outposts never have champagne…"

Davie sat next to Emma. The others began planning to spread across the city to be certain the stragglers from Asharti's army were no more. Davie took Emma's hand. It sent what must be the same electric shocks through her body as it had in the breakfast room of Fairfield House, but now they seemed magnified a thousand times.

"You are under no obligation, Emma," Davie murmured. He glanced down at their joined hands, unable to meet her eyes. "I know the Companion in your blood must seem a… a violation. If you want to cry off…"

"A violation?" She drew her brows together. Did that mean he was the one who wanted to cry off now that together might mean forever? Should she free him from his vow and let him have time to decide?

No, dash it all! What good was being a rebel if you couldn't tell the truth and demand truth in return and damn the consequences? She'd know how he felt for certain if she could look into his eyes. Diplomat or no, he wouldn't be able to hide how he felt about her. That was why he wouldn't look at her, because he knew his eyes left him vulnerable. She lifted his chin.

What she saw in his eyes was so complex she needed a moment to interpret it. He had put up a wall. He thought he was making his eyes calm and flat. But underneath was such longing that no wall could hide it.

She smiled. "Can you call the life we feel, this sensation of wholeness, a violation? I call it a gift."

"The gift comes with a few drawbacks," he managed, swallowing.

She smiled and gave a tiny shrug. "So does life."

He cleared his throat. "Does… does that mean… ?"

"It means I have no intention of releasing you from your promise, Davie Ware. It means I want to know what all this sensation flooding me will feel like in bed naked with you, with your lips on my body and your cock between my thighs. I have been unable to think of almost anything else for the last hour. Am I making myself clear enough here?"

He flushed and laughed, whether in embarrassment at her language or in sympathy with her wishes she'd wager even he wasn't sure. They noticed the silence around them at the same time. They turned their heads.

The others in the room were staring at them, some with frank amusement in their eyes. Emma felt her rebellion dissolve into a fiery blush.

Davie stood, squeezing her hand for reassurance. "I… I crave a boon," he announced to everyone and no one.

"We are leaving you alive," the gaunt vampire with the mustachios noted.

"Once I would not have counted that a boon," Davie said. He looked down at Emma and his eyes were soft. Then he glanced to Rufford. "I release you from your vow, you know."

"Thought you would," Rufford said wryly. "I'm glad my services will not be needed."

"Yes… well," Davie continued, surveying the room. "I was wondering if any of you monks from Mirso Monastery are… are priests or… or capable of performing marriage rites. Miss Fairfield and I have recited the vows… unofficially, but we'd like to consecrate them."

A small man in a simple black woolen robe stood. "You could call us experts in Vows. I'll perform your rites."

"Brother Flavio, would the Elders approve? The Rules dictate that we live one to a city. That doesn't allow for marriage." The mustachioed vampire frowned.

Brother Flavio cocked his head. "I wonder if that Rule is the reason no children are born, Delanus. These two are new enough that they might get precious children." He looked from Rufford to the Countess and back to Emma and Davie. "We have several pairings represented here. I don't think they mean to live one to a city." He approached Davie and Emma. He had to look up into Davie's face. He searched it for what seemed a long time and then turned his attention to Emma. She couldn't help but flush, but she held her head high and looked him straight in the eye.

"Kneel," he said.

Davie grabbed a cushion from one of the chairs for her knees and knelt beside her. He fairly glowed. And she knew that before she had crossed her line she had only been half-alive. Her spirit was strong now and she wanted Davie in a spiritual way that was much larger than she could have imagined before and in a profane way as well.

Brother Flavio motioned to Rufford and the Countess, who came to range themselves on either side. "You two shall witness, who have gone before."

"Your blood calls, one to the other, life to life," Brother Flavio intoned. "Will you answer her blood, Major Ware?"

"I will," Davie said firmly in that baritone rumble she loved so.

"His blood calls to your blood, Miss Fairfield. Will you answer?"

"I will," she said, thinking how far the drawing rooms of England were behind her now.

"Then for all the years there are, the Companion will sing inside you, one to the other."

It was like a singing, a humming vibration of energy deep in her veins that sang to her.

"You are now joined."

Applause broke out around the circle that had gathered. Whistles sounded. "Here, here!" and, "A toast!" "Ware, you dog, kiss her!"

Davie leaned down. His eyes glowed, not red but blue. "Forever," he murmured, and just brushed her lips.

"Forever," she whispered, and pulled his head down to kiss him thoroughly. Sensations flooded her that could not be described but hinted that a lifetime of trying might be worthwhile.

"Whoa, boy!" Rufford chortled, patting Davie on the back. "Get thee upstairs for that sort of thing. My virgin eyes are seared with such displays of passion."

Davie got up and pulled Emma up beside him. He tucked her into his side. She fit well there, and the warmth of his body made her blood rise. "As you will." He nodded crisply and pulled Emma toward the stairs. At the bottom, he paused. "Consider my duty discharged, Rufford. This is no place for my wife. You'll have to clean up the remains here yourself."

Davie had given over duty for her sake. It was the final gift that he could give her. Emma saw Rufford grin. "I recommend the New World," he said. "Plenty of room there."

The sun was rising outside. She knew it even though the draperies of their room were pulled shut and the shutters latched against it. The world already seemed new. They had the whole day ahead of them for loving.

A forever of days.