Page 51 of Tell No Tales
For Klaus, and for the kitten, he was willing to try.
∞∞∞
Klaus
Klaus tasted his rage instead of his dinner. He needed to rebuild his strength, so he spooned the fish soup into his mouth until the bowl was empty. It didn't fill the void in his soul.
Nor did it replace Vadim's voice in his head. He still hadn't reopened the link between them.
Gods, he was just starting to think he had feelings for Vadim beyond their physical attraction, but now … How could he trust a man who wouldn't heal a tiny, helpless creature?
He returned to their makeshift cabin when he finished eating. Hannah asked if he was all right, but he barely heard them. He thought he wanted to be alone, but he wished for their company the moment the door shut between them. The crate still smelled of Vadim and sex.
Desperate for fresh air, Klaus spent a few minutes in the hold. He gathered his night shirt and another book from his trunk. Once dressed, he hunkered down in the open door of the crate to read.
His blocking technique worked so well, he missed Vadim's approach until the man hovered above him in his light.
"I hate you," Klaus whispered.
"You made that abundantly clear when you screamed it in my head." Vadim held out his hand. "Someone wants to say hello."
Klaus glanced up and saw striped gray and white paws extending from Vadim's hand, a little dark gray tail wrapped around his wrist. The tail then unwrapped and whipped into the air.
A live kitten, then. Not his kitten. "You asshole! You really think I wanted one of the others?"
Vadim kneeled beside him, extending the kitten over his book. Klaus recognized the kitten as the one he'd been petting in the box, but he couldn't believe it. How could this be the kitten? It had died!
"Kittens don't get blazing fever, do they?"
"No. They don't."
Klaus's vision clouded with tears. He didn't think he had any left. "You said you couldn't do anything."
"I didn't."
Klaus wiped the tears away so he could glare at Vadim.
"All right, I did, but it's not what you think." Vadim placed the kitten on the floor and then removed a waxed paper package from the pocket of his jacket.
"I think it's necromancy," Klaus said, suppressing a shudder. "I've seen them, you know. Pleasure houses reanimate the dead until they start to rot. Get two or three uses out of them on the house. Some customers even prefer it."
He felt Vadim's shock and concern at the words, but he didn't outwardly show it as he unwrapped the package and set the kitten down at the edge of it. The scent of fish guts wafted toward Klaus. The stench almost turned his stomach, even though they were fresh from the night's dinner.
"Then you know the dead have no need for food."
The kitten sniffed at the paper and then toddled on unsteady feet to bury itself face-first in the gore. Its eyes were still crusty, and its fur matted along its flank from where the mother cat had lick-shoved it to the corner.
"Did you heal it, or not? Why does it still look half-dead?" Klaus sniffled. "It looks like it could die again at any moment."
Vadim had put his glove on while Klaus watched the kitten, but he removed it again and smoothed his hand over the kitten's fur, replacing the dull gray with a shine. Klaus noticed the kitten had pretty light gray swirls on its haunches, when before it had all looked the same uniform gray.
"Your hair didn't change color." Vadim had sported a gold streak in his white hair after Niall had brought Renald back to life.
"It shouldn't." Vadim kneeled beside Klaus and let him inspect his full head of hair. It was still a uniform white. "I have balance now," Vadim said when Klaus confirmed it.
"Wouldn't that give you half-white and half your original hair color?"
Vadim frowned. "I think I had the option to change it back to blond when I took Martiz's power from him, but this is who I am."
