Page 23 of The Vanishing
“I agree completely.” Cellina nods. After a moment, she smiles, tilting her head. “Did you know he can dance really well?”
Haruka blinks and draws back. “I… did not.”
“Yup. When he had very hard days after his mom died, I’d blast music in his room and we’d dance. Your hubby has moves.”
For the first time in three days, Haruka smiles, thinking that although he has never seen his mate dance, Nino’s moves are definitely evident in other areas.
“Hm, what else…” Cellina looks up to the ceiling, thinking. “When he was little, he used to bite into apples and peaches with his fangs and suck all the juice out. He would tell me that he was practicing to be really good at feeding. It was so cute but so weird… Oh! He’s also really good at chess and other strategy games.”
“I know about this,” Haruka admits, amused. “I asked him to play chess with me once. He was reluctant, so I thought his skills were likely novice. But he beat me. When I suggested shogi, he complained and called it an ‘old man’s game,’ but then he beat me at that as well.”
Cellina laughs, a sparkling sound that fills the room. “Healwayswins—against me, Giovanni, my little brother, Cosimo… even Domenico. Nobody can beat him. He’s so blasé while he’s playing, so you think he’s not paying attention. But then you look up and realize you’re toast!”
He chuckles with Cellina, his heart warm but still in pieces from the reality of the situation.
“He chose you,” Cellina says. “It took Nino a very long time to give himself to someone, and it’s only been a year of your bond. I think you two have a long way to go, Haruka. This is just a bump in the road. We’ll get through this.”
“What if we don’t? Cellina, I… I have failed in keeping him safe—”
“You haven’t.” She squeezes his palm a little tighter. “You had no idea something like this could happen. We were totally caught off guard, but it’ll be alright. Have hope.”
Sighing, he drops his shoulders. “It is difficult to be optimistic when life has been merciless and cruel in the past.”
“But life also gave you Nino.”
Haruka nods, the simple statement and the implication behind it undeniable. “Yes.”
She scoots a little closer, laying her head against his shoulder and gripping his hand tight. “So we’ll get him back. And you don’t need to sit here in misery all by yourself. We’re here because we’re your family. We’re going through this together.”
When they’re silent again, the sound of the heavy downpour rushes to the forefront. Haruka doesn’t know what to do. He isn’t sure that he trusts life to send him something so good without then ruthlessly snatching it away from him. Hope feels like an indiscernible thing. Something out of focus and far away. But he acknowledges Cellina’s warmth and kindness. That much is tangible.
Haruka squeezes her palm back and takes a deep breath, relaxing against the magnolia scent of her mixed in with the rain.
Twelve
“So how did you know he was the one? The one you wanted to bond with.”
Ladislao sits perched on an old, tufted ottoman at the end of the bed. He’s leaning over the chipped brass railing, staring at Nino in the dim candlelight. Everything in the room feels old. Outdated, as if the house were built and decorated sometime in the 1800s and hasn’t been touched since. There are light fixtures, but no electricity, and the air around them is dank and cold—the wind howling and rushing outside as soft rain pelts the window.
Nino lies on his back across the top of the bed, palm pressed to his forehead and his eyes closed in concentration. They’d had a stand-off where Nino refused to sit in the bed with Ladislao. The latter conceded (reluctantly and despite many promises that he wouldn’t try anything), encouraging Nino to get off the icy, dirty floor.
Sighing, Nino opens his eyes with heavy lids. He stares up at the darkened ceiling, calling Haruka’s face to his mind: his warm burgundy eyes, the soft pucker of his lips and the tiny mole just off the bridge of his nose. “His nature sang to me, like… in me and through me. It came to a point where being with him was easier and more natural than being without him. I wanted everything from him, and I’d never felt that way about anyone before.”
“Mm, can’t say I’ve ever felt that way… and I’ve banged a lot of different kinds of creatures—humans and vampires.”
Nino shakes his head against the bed, eyes drifting shut.
“But I have fun, you know?” Ladislao says. “In my own ways. Once, I had an affair with a two-hundred-year-old first-gen queen from an aboriginal tribe in Australia. Maybe she was my favorite? And another time, I had a human female who had once been a male, and she—”
A quiet knock at the door makes Nino’s eyes flicker open. He sits upright, slow and groaning from the nausea still swirling in his body. Ladislao lifts a hand in reassurance. “No stress, honeycomb, it’s just feeding time. Breakfast.”
“But it’s night.”
“The vampires here are nocturnal.” Ladislao stands from the ottoman and walks across the creaking floorboards. He cracks the door open, peeking through. After a polite greeting, he opens it wide. A small female vampire with a head full of wild and curly hair enters. She’s carrying a fanciful tray in one hand and holding the handle of a firelit lantern in the other. The soft glow of light does little to hedge the darkness within the room.
Nino looks toward the door and notices the tall vampire with the missing ear standing just outside, so he flares the strength of his aura outward to cover himself. The vampire sneers through the crack before turning and shifting out of view.
After setting the tray on a small table, Ladislao takes the frail female by the hand. Her hesitation is obvious, and she is fearful as he guides her toward Nino.
