Page 57 of Slaying the Vampire Conqueror

“Well, whatever you did, thanks,” he said. “He was in a much better mood tonight.”

Then he left, closing the door behind him, and the room was silent. I crawled to my bed and fell into it. My body and soul were exhausted. I closed my eyes and waited for sleep to take me.

And then, in the secret silence, where no one could see me, I trailed my fingertips up my own arm. Just out of curiosity. Just to remember how it felt.

A meaningless touch.

Strange thing to crave.

A knock jolted me awake.

I forced myself upright, awareness settling around me. Someone was at my door. Not Erekkus. Not Atrius, either.

I rose and opened it, revealing one of Atrius’s errand boys.

“Apologies for waking you, seer,” he said. “He requests you.”

Nothing more needed to be said. I found Atrius near the fire again, slumped in that chair. This time, there was no talking. He gave me a mildly embarrassed look and opened his mouth, and I stopped him before the words made it out.

“It’s alright,” I said. “I know. You don’t needto explain.”

The compassion in my voice surprised me.

The progress I’d made last night had loosened the knot inside him, though the pain was bad again tonight. We didn’t speak as I worked at it, freeing what little I could of his threads from the hold of the curse, then afterwards ushering him into sleep. This time, I followed him there not long after.

He came for me the next night too, and the next. And then finally, on the fifth night—the last night we would remain in Alka—I went to his door of my own accord when dawn approached.

When he opened the door and stared at me, I said, “I thought I would save us the time.”

He was silent for a long moment, then nodded and let me in.

Helping him was hard work. It did not come naturally to me. It left me drained and depleted. So why was it that a small part of myself was relieved when he let me inside? Why did I find an uneasy comfort in the warmth of his soul next to mine? I had no nightmares of my own in his room. I didn’t know what to make of that.

Maybe we’re all just animals,I thought to myself, as I dozed off that night, my grip still loosening around Atrius’s presence.It’s nice not to sleep alone.

CHAPTER TWENTY

“Vasai?”

I choked on the word, like it went down my throat the wrong way. I took a sip of water to disguise it, letting my hair hide my face as I ducked my head with the movement.

The name should have meant nothing to me.

Fifteen years should have reduced it to nothing but a distant memory that I wasn’t even supposed to have. Once one became an Arachessen, the time before was meaningless. That’s why the Arachessen preferred to recruit very young children. Clean slates. But at ten years old, my slate had been very, very dirty, and I never forgot that. I kept trying to scrub it blank.

This involuntary reaction was a stray mark that never should have been allowed to remain.

I swallowed another gulp of water. Atrius stared at me. I couldn’t rely on the darkness to hide my face.

“Yes,” he said, tone adding an unspoken,Obviously.

He sat cross-legged, straight-backed, on his bedroll, which was covered with open books and papers. His tent was mostly bare. We were moving fast these days. He didn’t bother wasting his time or his men’s setting up furniture. Actually, he seemed more comfortable this way—on the ground surrounded by a chaotic sea of plans. He barely appeared to pay attention to them, anyway. From what I saw, captainshanded him papers and he glanced at them and then made some kind of deranged decision based on whatever direction the wind was blowing that night. It made the mission of trying to understand his strategy much more difficult—even from such intimate spaces as his tent.

I spent a lot of time in strangely… intimate situations with Atrius, now.

We had left Alka’s capital weeks ago, and still, every night, I went to his tent. I helped him with his curse. I helped him sleep. I fell asleep beside him. The routine had grown rote, second nature. Now we barely spoke while we did it. When nightfall came again, we awoke without a word to each other, and I returned to my own tent. I never brought it up. I knew he didn’t want to acknowledge it, and this was the time to build his trust in me.

I would wait, I decided, before I started to push. It would be better if he was the one to start talking first. For now, I knew that every night I went without asking questions he didn’t want to answer, he’d trust me a little bit more.

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