Page 97 of House of Crimson Kisses
She snort-laughs and swigs from her tumbler, which, if I’m not mistaken, has rum and blood with essence of hate in it. Interesting drink of choice.
“Not a fucking chance,” she says.
“So this is still war?” I ask.
“Oh, absolutely. When is it not love and war?” She gives me a fang-filled grin.
“Then I guess I’ll see you on the battlefield.”
“That you will.” She holds her glass up to me and we clink. And for the first time in the five hundred years I’ve known her, she smiles at me. Really, truly smiles. It softens her face, makes her eyes bright and her whole expression light up.
She inclines her head at me, a rare expression of deference I am not used to and then vanishes into the club’s gloom. What the hell did she experience in there?
Xavier sidles up next to me. “Favourite.”
“Good evening,” I say and tilt my head up for him to kiss.
He places a soft peck on my cheekbone and then leans against the same pillar I am.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Not even slightly,” he says.
“What happened?”
“You’ll laugh.”
“Try me,” I say.
“Gods, it was awful. I was… The aesthetic healers… you know the ones that can do procedures that aren’t really for healing… They couldn’t help. I was… I was so…”
Mother of Blood, is he joking? I keep my mouth shut, but my lip is quirking as I try to suppress the urge to laugh.
“I was rotten to the core, Tave. I was ugly on the inside, too. The outside… I wasn’t a good vampire.”
I have to rub my mouth to wipe the smirk off my lips.
“I told you you’d laugh.”
“I’m sorry, I’m being an arsehole. I understand why that would be traumatic for you, and I’m sorry you experienced it.”
“I can’t shake it. Every time I look in the mirror, it’s like I can see the shadow of who I was in there. What the fuck was that trial?”
I take his face in mine. “Xavier, you are beautiful inside and out. You live in a beautiful city, with a beautiful sister and a beautiful home. You’re safe now because you’re with me. Okay? This is real.” I tip his forehead down and kiss his brow.
He physically relaxes under my touch.
“Better?” I ask.
He nods. I didn’t compel him, but sometimes the illusion of something is enough for us to believe it. Just like those trials, I suppose.
“What did you find out?” he asks.
I shake my head. I’m not ready to tell anyone that yet. How do I explain I am the daughter of a god? The daughter of the Mother of Blood herself? Or perhaps that’s not what she is after all. We mythologised her into a god. She was just another witch trying her best, but because of one curse, she changed the face of our city and the trajectory of her fate.
Our entire city’s foundation is based on her myth. What am I supposed to do with that information? I want to fix our city, not break it. If I tell anyone, then the church, our pillars of law, the very fibre of our beliefs, it all goes away.
And Mother, Cordelia, knows that.
