Page 26 of Their Blood Queen

That was an attractive offer, but this human was proposing something in uncharted territory.

“And if it doesn’t take?” I had asked, referring to any offspring the union might produce. An Elite family that was not immortal would need heirs to continue its line.

This female the Rinhold line was so interested in was a risk. There had once been an Elite family who’d attempted to create a new breed of humans. It had resulted in many casualties and a poor selection pool, ultimately pitching the family below quota requirements.

It had not ended well for them.

This, though, was a new take on a failed concept. By bringing in one of the surviving villagers into an Elite family fold, only their own line would be manipulated.

“Then we will accept a bastard child to continue our line,” Earl Rinhold had said. “Regardless, our village’s selections will still proceed as planned with no interruptions.”

It was a smart reply. There was no risk from my side of things. I had been intrigued by the idea of a family wishing to offer up its own line as candidates for Monsters Night. It was certainly one way to stand out once they rose to the ranks of Immortals.

Whomever Earl Rinhold would select for his bride would become immortal, too, so if he wished to breed her intentionally, he had to choose carefully.

A female originally from a village rather than a born Elite explained her compatibility with me. That meant she was one of the humans genetically modified to be compatible with monsters.

“She is the key.”

Did Earl Rinhold know how true that statement was?

She is the key to everything.

I can’t lose you, I think as I reach out to her. I simply want to curl a lock of her gorgeous red hair behind her ear, but she flinches when my claws part through the shadows twining around her.

My hand is twice the size of her head. I’m not sure what I was thinking in trying to touch her, even in this realm, but I seem to have disturbed her territory enough for her to finally notice me.

She looks me dead in the face.

Then opens her mouth.

And screams.

CHAPTER 6

SABRE

A scream.

The delicious sound has me frozen, completely thrusting out any of the thoughts I’d just been having and replacing them with hunger.

The sound is faint, though, as if I might have imagined it. And when I peer beyond the veil that exists between this world and the world of dreams, I catch something that shouldn’t be there.

A shimmer swirls through the room, elusive, weak, but interesting. It travels through the objects surrounding me as if it can’t interact with them.

Red velvet furniture.

Gaudy diamond chandeliers.

A bar I probably utilize far too much—and is unfortunately stocked with booze instead of blood.

The air is heavy and the colors are muted as I skillfully shift my perception and try to track the disturbance, a talent that’s more seamless for those in the royal line of Strigoi. I’m a dreamwalker, a vampire who feasts on dreams.

My medium? Blood. The elixir of life holds the code of a being’s past, present, and future, if one knows where to look.

And it seems that I’m the one dreaming now, because the enticing shimmer that’s vibrating through the air can’t be real.

I’m going mad.

---