Page 50 of Across the Sapphire Sea
There was no sense in worrying over what could not be changed. Elias would be fine. Valeri would protect him at any cost.
Rapping on the door to Lajos’s private studio, Valeri shifted from foot to foot with impatience.
For a vampire he suspected worked directly for the court of the ancients, Lajos had a cover story that was remarkably convincing. Lajos primarily used oils for his paintings, and his imagery was impossibly realistic down to the last detail. Not limited to one style, Lajos painted portraits, still lifes, landscapes, and even massive depictions from mythology. His talent knew no limit, and was wasted on a vampire stuck in the Arctic Circle compelled to do the bidding of others.
Valeri despised him.
Not for his wasted talent, but for the lies he’d told which had stalled Valeri’s progress finding the court of ancients in the first place.
Lajos swung open the door and scowled upon seeing Valeri at his threshold. Valeri met the scowl with one of his own.
“Back so soon?” Reddish-blond eyebrows arched to twin points on Lajos’s pale forehead. He wore a muslin shift covered head to toe in dried paint. A rainbow of stains scattered across the garment but concentrated on his right thigh where he had an obvious habit of wiping the brush. “I suppose I should have suspected as much. Of all the seekers, you’re the most persistent, Valeri. But where is your darling fledgling? Don’t tell me you’ve come without Elias.”
“Never mind Elias,” Valeri huffed and pushed his way inside. “I need a favor.”
“By all means, do come in.” Sarcasm laced Lajos’s tone. He shut the door behind them.
Valeri inhaled the nutty scent of the linseed oil used to mix paints. Lit brighter than a Hallows’ Eve pumpkin, the studio was massive, but there was nowhere to sit. Canvases in various stages of completion lay on every surface. Probably for the best, Valeri didn’t intend to stay long.
Standing with a hand on a cocked hip, Lajos pursed his lips. With a svelte frame, and delicate, feminine features, his stature wasn’t intimidating, but his glare was. He waved his free hand as he spoke, paintbrush dangling from his fingers. “Whatever can I do for you? In the market for a portrait, maybe? Elias is always welcome to come sit for me, with those angelic cheekbones and cupid’s bow lips, that button of a nose… Painting your lover would be my pleasure—”
“Enough. You know I’m not here for a painting.” Although the idea of an image of Elias that would be his forever, something to keep when the real Elias had finally had his fill of Valeri, well, it was tempting. But not what Valeri came for.
“Of course you aren’t.” Lajos gave an overly dramatic sigh. “A shame really, because a painting would be possible, and what you’re about to ask me for…is not.”
Valeri glowered. “You don’t know what I’m here to ask for.”
Lajos glanced up at him through lowered lashes. “Try me.”
“I need an audience with the court of the ancients, and this time I will not take no for an answer.”
Lajos yawned as if he were bored. “You really think I didn’t know that? You’re quite predictable in your demands. The answer continues to be no.”
“I expected as much. Now for the part you don’t know. I’ve brought a delegate from The Dozen who wishes to plead our case. Surely they won’t turn away the magnanimous Ash. Such an act would be intolerably rude and provoke the ire of the vampires of Bran Vigny.” Valeri was banking on the politics of vampire hospitality, that the ancients wouldn’t flout the tradition.
Lajos narrowed his gaze. He stood so still as to take on the presence of a statue and not a living, breathing being.
Valeri fought the urge to step back and put more space between them. He wasn’t easy to intimidate, but there was a warning in Lajos’s posture. In his glower. Something primal in Valeri reacted to the threat Lajos posed, the hidden power in his petite, girlish frame.
“Let me be sure I have you correct,” Lajos drawled, enunciating each word. “You’ve taken the information you learned in part from my help, that the court of the ancients is indeed nearby, and, having failed to gain an audience for yourself, you’ve run home to The Dozen. The Dozen. Who banished you to my realm in the first place. With your tail between your legs, you ran to them, and what? Told them there are vampires here older than them by millennia? I wonder what lies you spouted to convince them to loan you a precious delegate. Have you made promises you can’t keep, Valeri? Hmm?”
Valeri’s back hit the wall. He hadn’t realized he was moving until the jolt of it stopped him.
Lajos hadn’t budged. He held the tip of the paintbrush’s handle to his lips, waiting for Valeri to fill the silence.
“I didn’t have to resort to lies. I discovered the truth in my time with the Breodun people whomyousent me to see. Their keeper of records knew more than you thought. The truth was enough to warrant the delegate.”
“And what, pray tell, is this truth you claim to have uncovered?”
“That the ancients possess a cure for the aging sickness.” Valeri would not let slip what he thought that cure was. “That they haven’t shared such a secret is criminal. We would have this cure. A vampire suffers as we speak. Mahu.”
“One vampire’s suffering doesn’t justify the price you ask us to pay. There is a reason that information is kept secret. Surely even you can parse out some theories as to why. Knowledge in the wrong hands is dangerous. You’ve caught a lion in a squirrel’s trap. He roars with fury. He’ll chew off his own leg to get his revenge. You should turn around and go home before he breaks free. Forget what you think you know.”
“I will not. You speak in riddles, but let me speak plainly. I demand an audience with the ancients. If this is in your power to grant, I expect you to do so. If it’s not, which is what I’m guessing, I expect you to seek clearance from one who can. Without delay.”
Lajos considered, his expression dour. “Your demands are unwise. This won’t go how you think it will. I’ll give you one last warning, though you don’t deserve the courtesy. Take your fledging and your delegate and run while you still can.”
“I’ve given you my answer,” Valeri huffed. “I won’t be intimidated any further. Do your job.”
