Page 28 of Flirting with Darkness

“And that field is…?”

“I was a general.”

“A good one?”

Even as the question left my lips, I knew it was a stupid one. I’d seen Vale fight now. Like it was an art.

“The third best in the House of Night,” he replied, very seriously, and that— well, I wasn’t expecting that kind of honesty.

“The first two must have been something to behold, now that I’ve seen you in action.”

The corner of his mouth lifted. “They were. But they are dead, and I’m still here.”

And if anything startled me more than his first answer had, it was this.

Because I recognized something in that tone… something human, something vulnerable. My gaze flicked to him, and he was staring at the weapons with an odd, faraway look in his eye. The kind of expression I saw on the faces of those who walked by their family’s grave sites.

“You said you oversaw the loss of a war,” I said.

He flinched—actually flinched.

“Yes.”

“And that’s why you came here.”

“Yes.”

“Why did you keep all of this?”

“It’s valuable. I wouldn’t leave it behind.”

It was more than that. Perhaps the long, hard stare I gave him told him I knew it, too.

“They’re mine,” he said, after a moment. “If I sold them or left them in Obitraes, they would have been used in someone else’s war. Maybe they would have been used against the same men I led. I wouldn’t let that happen.”

Strange, how vampires and humans were so different and yet so much alike.

“Did you save them because you thought you might need them again?”

A long, long silence. Vale’s eyes went distant, his body still—I had never seen a creature who could be so, so still, like he didn’t even breathe.

“No,” he said, at last, and closed the door.

Then he turned to me and said, “Do you need my blood, if you’re going to insist on wandering around?”

* * *

Vale’s skin was warm. I felt like I noticed a new thing about it every time I touched him. Even his veins were more elegant than those of a human, the pattern to them more delicate and intentional, the darkness visible in streaks of color like embroidery under the thinnest skin of his inner wrist.

We sat in silence as I took the first vial of blood.

He looked past me, and I followed his gaze to the vase on the coffee table—containing three flowers. I’d given him the last one when I was still half-unconscious, apparently, though I didn’t remember doing this. It had gotten a little crumpled in all the excitement of the last few days, but was still just as beautiful as its siblings, petals perfect black and vivid red.

“I still see nothing remarkable about them,” he grumbled.

“They’re very remarkable. I promise.”

“I’m starting to think you might be lying to me.”

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