Page 24 of Queen of Darkness
“And then just left?”
“Aaron did say he was a bit blunt. I suppose after so many years living alone, you don’t develop much of a bedside manner.”
“Definitely not used to hosting. Might have something to do with his preoccupation with swinging a sword at anyone who comes near.”
“It might,” Fred agreed.
“What now?”
“Now,” he said, easing past me down the hallway, “we look for some shelter. And you tell me what it is that you couldn’t at the Broker’s.”
Chapter Thirteen
It didn’t take us long to find where Drakul must spend most of his time. Although the creepy count was nowhere to be seen, the hallway spit us out in a long, rectangular room. Torches guttered in wall sconces lining the sides, and in the center of the room, a rectangular table sat at the foot of an elevated throne.
I expected to see Drakul sitting on his throne, lording over his imaginary subjects, but that, too, was empty. The benches on the table were old but in decent shape. Wistfully, I looked at the empty tabletop, wishing it were covered with food. Now that I was a vampire, I technically only needed blood to sustain me, but food was always welcome.
Don’t think about it, and you won’t be as hungry.
The words applied to everything.
Fred didn’t hesitate. He walked over to the table and plopped down on a bench. “Waiter!” he bellowed wistfully, shaking his head.
“The service just isn’t as good as the Broker’s, I know,” I said, moving to join him. What else was I going to do? “But you have to admit the décor is … also not as good.”
“I will admit that,” Fred chuckled before subsiding into a waiting silence.
“We had a disagreement,” I said, knowing he was waiting for me to elaborate about Aaron and me.
“To the point that he wouldn’t come with you?” Fred said. “Must have been one hell of a knockdown fight. Did you tell him his suits make his butt look big or something?”
I snickered, unable to hold back my laughter. “No, but thank you for that bit of ammunition. I’ll make good use of that, I promise.”
Tapping the table, I shook my head. “The truth is, Fred, it wasn’t that he didn’t come with me. It’s that I left him. Him, Fenrir, everyone. I left them behind in Seguin and came on my own.”
I purposefully left out the bit about Johnathan wanting me to leave town for the sake of his pack. It wasn’t pertinent to the story, and I didn’t want to relive the embarrassment.
“You just left without telling him where you were going?”
“He’s not my keeper,” I said, perhaps a bit too sharply.
“True,” Fred agreed. “But he’s done a whole lot for you. He cares about you.”
“I know that. But he didn’t agree with my decided course of action. I wasn’t going to change my mind just because he didn’t like it.”
“What course of action?”
“Elenia,” I said softly, looking up at him, preparing for the same blowback I’d gotten from Aaron. “This won’t stop with her on the throne. She’ll come after me, my mother, who knows who else. Too many have already suffered and died at her hands, all because I’m something I couldn’t control. Well, no more! No more deaths, no more random acts of murder just because a vampire happens to be a woman. That ends, Fred. I’m going after her, and I’m not stopping until I’m sitting on her throne with her dead body at my feet.”
I paused, catching myself from getting too worked up, while I held on for Fred’s opposing views.
Instead, Fred shot to his feet, slamming a fist on the table hard enough to make it jump. “Fuckingfinally!” he shouted. “Hell, yes! Let’s depose that bitch. I amin!”
My jaw practically hit the floor as I gaped at him, open-mouthed and wide-eyed.
“Oh, come on,” Fred said, sitting back down. “Are you really that surprised?”
“Well, based on how Aaron had the exactoppositereaction to you, yes, I am.”
