Page 129 of Blood Mosaic

“You’re still alive, volchitsa. Your teeth are just sharper now.” He snapped again, enjoying the curl of her lip. “Like I said, awater vampire should be teaching you all this, but instead, you have me.”

“A fire vampire.” She walked to the fountain. “Your opposite.”

“Elements don’t work like that.” He snapped his fingers and brought a flame to his hand. “Ideally, they work in cooperation, not in conflict.”

Tatyana reached down, splashed a stream of water at Oleg’s hand, and doused his flame. “Except there’s that.”

He smiled. “There is that.” He shook off his hand and wiped the damp on his trousers, watching Tatyana’s eyes follow his hand to his thigh. Then her eyes drifted to his cock, which decided to stand at attention again now that she was admiring it.

“Do you want to learn about your amnis?” he asked. “Or do you want to fuck me? I am open to either option tonight.”

Her cheeks didn’t blush like they used to, but he could see the mortification in her expression.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“Don’t be.”

Tatyana shook her head. “I can’t seem to control… anything. I’m not thinking clearly and my reaction to you is just?—”

“Normal.” He tried to make his voice as neutral as possible, even though the part of him that wanted her was tempted to crow in victory. “We were not indifferent to each other when you were human, Tatyana. Now you are immortal.Allyour appetites are ravenous with new power.” He snapped his fingers again. “For now pay attention.”

“Will you stop snapping at me?” She snarled. “I hate it.”

Oleg walked over to her, held his hand in front of her face, and snapped, sparking a tiny amount of static electricity that his amnis grabbed and fed until the flame was the size of Tatyana’s head.

“We may not have the same element,” he murmured, “but we both have amnis. You need to become aware of yours and learn how to control it.”

She crossed her arms over her chest again. “I don’t feel anything like that… snapping. Or sparking.”

“Yes, you do.”

“I don’t.” She was getting angry. She was a newborn—even the slightest provocation could send her into a rage.

“It’s running under your skin right now.” He kept his voice calm. “It connects to the water in the air, even in your own body.”

He saw the water in the fountain begin to move, pulling toward Tatyana as her emotions heightened.

Oleg glanced at the water. “Do you feel it now?”

“I don’t?—”

“Don’t saythink,” he hissed. “Don’tthinkabout it. Feel. Stop thinking like a human when you’re a vampire.”

“I don’t want to be a vampire!” She threw her arm out and the water in the fountain followed her motion, leaping from the pool and dashing him across the face as his flame went out.

Oleg grinned, and he knew his fangs were out. “Good.”

Tatyana looked at her hands, shaking her head. “I don’t know how I did that.”

“The water is drawn to you. Itwantsto obey you.”

“How?”

“Feel. It.” In the blink of an eye, he was in her face. The water had drenched him, and his shirt clung to his body. “You told me once that when I kissed you, it felt like champagne bubbles along your skin.”

Tatyana looked up, and her fangs were already long in her mouth. “I don’t remember that.”

“You’d been drinking.” He grabbed her chin, yanked her face up, and kissed her. Hard. “Then you insulted me and I left you alone.”

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