Page 62 of The Crimson Princess
I can sense he waits for me to react in some horrid way, but there are horrors in the history of every race. “I assumed or they wouldn’t have tales of vampires and vampire hunters.”
There’s a flare of approval in him, but he says no more on the topic. “Dress like you’re on Earth and you’ll fit in.” A moment later, he’s fully dry and dressed in black jeans, a snug black T-shirt, and combat boots.
I follow his lead, and dress to mimic his attire, eager to blend in when I’m already the outsider in Bloodstone. Toren captures my hand and walks me to him. “Ready?”
“Where are we going?”
“My home in the city.”
“I haven’t even seen this home.”
“I know, but I really need you to understand my world before you leave and that happens in the city.”
The way he wanted my father to understand years before. I’m the future queen and this morning is all about preventing me from ever thinking I would attack his world. “I’m not him, Toren.”
He strokes his hand down my hair. “I know that, Satima.”
“Do you?”
“How else can you influence your father to avoid war if you don’t understand who you’d be fighting?”
There is truth to his words I wish didn’t exist. “Will there be anyone else there?”
“Not yet, but you will meet some of those closest to me before the day is over.”
I offer a small nod of acceptance and Toren blinks us out of the bathroom.
We reappear inside a living room with soaring ceilings and leather furnishings, the dim glow of warm lights illuminating a wall with a fireplace. But just like in the bedroom in his mountain home, the front wall is a window, this one arched and towering fifty feet high. Beyond it is a city of lights and sky-high buildings, the tallest of all in the center, a steepled point at the top.
“It’s one of our military training facilities,” Toren explains.
I glance up at him. “There are more?”
“Many more.”
Stunned and spellbound by this revelation and the vast city before me, I close the space between me and the window and press my hands to the glass. Toren appears beside me, his hand resting on my shoulder. “What are you thinking?”
“We’re like an ancient village compared to you.”
“We have villages that look as ancient as yours. Some of our kind prefer that way of life. Think of it like the human realm you lived in for ten years. There are towns that look nothing like the big cities.”
I rotate to face him, and he leads me to the loveseat that faces the window where we sit down. “What do you want to ask?”
“My father wants all of this for himself.”
“He wants to call it his, yes, but I’d never submit to a king who rules as differently than I do, nor to one who tried to kill me after I saved him and his gales.”
“Explain that. Tell me more.”
“Macklemore was a problem. He had to be defeated, but the druids wanted worlds to submit to their rule even without Macklemore, but so did your father, Satima. I ended the druids’ play for control by fighting next to your father and the way he repaid me was by trying to kill me. I will never allow my world to kneel to him. Or anyone for that matter. And you need to know that should he and the druids come at us, we will stand to that challenge, and we will win.”
“I’m not suggesting you do, but I’m asking questions. The book chose him.”
He pushes to his feet and takes me with him. “Let’s talk about the book.” He blinks us and we end up in a vault lined with books. “This is the royal library of our most ancient and guarded texts.”
A thick ancient-looking book appears on the wooden table next to us. “And that is the Vampire Codex, written long before any time we remember, most of it in the early language long discarded.” Another book appears beside it. “That’s a modern version of generally accepted translations. You have your book. We have our book. And yes, you can read it yourself.”
“Tell me what I need to know.”
