Page 56 of King of the Damned
“Then what is it?”
“To break my curse, I have to kill you,” he says as if it’s an admission I haven’t already come to face. “But to become a vampire, you would have to be killed as I drink from you.” He cups my jaw in his large hands. “You will die either way, whether that's tomorrow or years from now, and I am not willing to risk your precious life in the hope that vampirism takes you instead of the Priestesses.”
His words weigh heavy on my heart, because I can’t comprehend how painful it has been for him to carry around that knowledge alone. I understand now how hard he has been trying to protect me from an uncertain fate.
“Are we truly destined for ruin?” I ask him, holding his hands to my heart. He leans his ear down to press against my chest, listening to the anxious beat as he tries to commit my life’s symphony to memory.
He does not answer me with words. Instead, a sob trembles out of his throat.
No embrace nor consolation comforts us in the moonlight as we desperately cling to the moment.
For we both know we may not have another.
Twenty-Five
Adelasia
Kaius and I dread the next full moon. For ten days, it looms over us. He never leaves my side, and while he finds the courage to smile for me, I can see right through it. He’s terrified, and truthfully, so am I.
Though I’ve witnessed death first-hand, the concept always seemed so far away. Death happened to others. Death happened around me. Certainly in the valley, death happened in front of me.
But nevertome.
I’ve been fairly quiet in the days after Kaius touched my soul through the most intimate part of me. I think about my impending doom almost every moment of the day and night. Not his kiss nor his touch brings me any distraction, though he certainly tries.
It’s become an unspoken understanding between us that we no longer look to the future. Instead, we focus on who we are now, not what we hope we can be.
Kaius also mourns his death. I can see it in his eyes. Not his physical death, but the true death of his mortality. While I don’t doubt his passion for me, I fear he’s struggling to cope. He’s spent ten centuries longing to be a human again. He’s giving that up for me. It’s a selfless act of love, but one that devastates him all the same.
The gloomy overcast of a cold nighttime thunderstorm rages outside as Kaius slowly kisses up the scar on my back. As thunder cracks through the open windows, he bites down on the curve of my neck. I sigh with pleasure and my hips rise from the bed towards him. He smiles against the mark he just left, and a drop of blood falls from his fangs onto my chest as I turn over to face him.
I swipe the drop off my chest and place it on the tip of my tongue. He takes it from me with a passionate kiss as he enters me once more, intertwining our fingers together as he fills me over and over again with long, slow strokes.
Lightning strikes across the sky and thunder shakes the palace as we finish together. Kaius shifts to his back and I lie on my side next to him. I trace patterns on his chest and he watches my fingers as I watch his eyes slowly change from feral black to their normal savage red hue.
He looks stronger and more dangerous than I’ve ever seen him. I suppose him telling me that I was invigorating was more than just a compliment. I find myself wondering what it would be like to feed from the person you love.
But I would never admit that to him. His refusal to turn me into a vampire or even discuss it with me holds firm. It’s almost like he can sense me thinking about it, and it puts him in a foul mood.
I fear it’s the only way to save me. Saveus.
And it’s the only thing he will not give me.
The storm outside grows more violent and the sky grows darker with it. A dense gray fog seeps into the room, and Kaius uses his magic to shut the windows to keep it out. As the rain falls harder, I yawn and curl up next to him, seeking the warmth of a comforting embrace that he cannot give me with his skin alone.
With a wave of his fingers, a short nightgown appears to cover my naked body. I stifle a giggle and slightly shake my rear to show him that I’ve noticed the lack of fabric. All he does in return is smile wickedly and squeeze my thigh in a teasing warning.
“Behave. You know how hard it is for me to keep my hands off of you,” he purrs.
I give him a subtle roll of my eyes and a slight upturn of my lips. “Yourhandsare not the problem,” I whisper back, nipping at his ear as I do.
He chuckles and rolls over on top of me to use his breath and teeth to tickle my neck. “You don’t seem to think it’s a problem when–”
He pauses suddenly and wheezes in pain, as a human would when the wind gets knocked out of them.
“Kai?” I ask, holding his cheeks in my hands. He makes the noise again and sits back. I sit up with him and say his name again. He looks at me, and his mouth moves, but no words come out.
A painful groan leaves his throat instead, and his hands wrap around his neck.
