Page 28 of Promised in Blood

I guess I can be a gentleman. For her, anyway. I will always be anything she wants me to be.

Chapter

Eleven

XAVIER

“Ready for your next lesson, Cupcake?”

She ties her long pink hair up with a hairband and nods.

I grab her ponytail, yanking her head back and running my nose along the column of her throat. “You are such a fucking distraction, Ophelia.”

Her giggle is cut off by Alexandros’s deep voice. “This is not the kind of lesson we are teaching, Xavier.”

I glance over my shoulder, my fingers still tangled in Ophelia’s hair. “I didn’t realize you’d be joining us.”

He rolls up his shirt sleeves, revealing powerful forearms lined with thick veins. The kind I’d like to trace my tongue over before sinking my teeth into.

His dark eyes narrow. “I said you would be assisting me, did I not?”

“Yeah, but… I didn’t realize that meant we’d be teaching together.” I assumed he’d simply tell me what to do. I don’t voice that last part, but I figure he hears it anyway because he scowls at me.

“Before we start, there is something important to understand about your power, Ophelia, and that is its source. You and Malachi will research it more thoroughly. But before we start this part of your training, it would help you both to have a basic understanding of an elementai’s powers.”

I release her hair, and she nods, eyes wide with excitement.

“Take a seat.” He gestures to the sofa and sits in the armchair. “Tell me what you understand of an elementai. Either of you.”

Ophelia glances at me, so I answer first. “Only what Kai has told me. They don’t need spells like witches do because they channel magic directly from the elements.”

“Yeah, that’s kind of what I thought,” Ophelia says. “Except they don’t need the element to channel? That’s where I get confused.”

The whole thing confuses the hell out of me. “I don’t get how that makes them so powerful though. Demons and vampires are born with power. It’s inherent. So how is a being that has to channel power stronger than that?” I squeeze my girl’s hand in mine, and she flashes me a sweet smile.

“Yeah, I don’t get that either.”

Alexandros draws a breath through his nose, a deep one that makes his nostrils flare. “It is difficult to explain.” His eyes land on the ficus tree that Malachi lovingly tends to. Hegrabs it and places it on the coffee table between us. “The elements themselves are a source of great power. Tsunamis have been known to decimate entire cities. A tornado can wipe out everything in its path. Earthquakes and wildfires—all proof of the raw, inherent power to be found within the elements. Vampires are born with magic in their blood. This power is directly linked to one of the elements and comes from a bloodline so old that no one knows of its origin. But each vampire house has magic derived from their elemental bloodline. For House Drakos, our powers are borne from fire. For several millennia before I was born, this meant control over fire, but it evolved as we did. Now, for sons of House Drakos, it is more common to have power over the mind.”

I lean forward in my seat, my curiosity for our history piqued in a way that it never has been before. Learning about what makes us who we are brings me closer to knowing more about our girl, and that means I’m all in.

“How is that linked to fire?” Ophelia asks.

“Fire is emotion. Passion, anger, jealousy, destruction. To control someone’s mind is to control their emotions. And when a vampire bonds with an elementai, whichever power they have mastery over also permeates that bloodline. It was why elementai with mastery over two elements were so highly prized.”

Ophelia rubs her temples. “So their children would take on the power of the other elements too?”

He shakes his head. “No. Not for vampire or elementai children. My mother had mastery over air and water. However, this simply strengthens our bloodline powers rather than changes them. So House Drakos, which has all four elements in its bloodline, is much stronger than Houses Chó_ma, Elira, and Thalassa, which only have two or three.”

I frown. “So elementai can cause natural disasters and stuff? Start fires? Knock someone over with a wave? I understand how they can make vampires stronger, but I still don’t get why that makes them these super powerful beings.”

“You are looking at this too literally, Xavier,” he explains. His tone is patient and calm, reminding me how good of a teacher he is. He takes a small amount of soil from the ficus pot and holds it in the palm of his hand. “Earth is inherently powerful. It gives life. It has a raging ball of energy at its core. Elementai who have mastery over earth have access to this power.” He runs a fingertip through the dirt in his palm. “Witches who can channel earth do so through the use of spells, but an elementai has it running through their veins.” He looks up at Ophelia. “The deep ancient power, the one that heals you when we bite you—do you feel that?”

She closes her eyes, and a smile spreads across her face. “Yes.”

“That is the earth line within you, Ophelia. Witches and elementai with mastery over earth are usually great healers.”

I knew there was something special about the cupcake, but I never for one minute imagined she had the kind of power the professor is talking about. And the way he’s speaking, the emotion in his eyes when he looks at her—I don’t think I’ve ever seen him like this before. I never thought I’d bear witness to Alexandros Drakos being awed by anything, and yet here we are.

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