Midnight Bites Read Online Free Page B

nodded. “I think I might, sometimes, when I drink it so warm. Odd, how I never hear it when they’re dying before me in real life. Only when I drink apart from the hunt. Is that normal, do you think?”
    â€œWhatever is normal in this world, we have no part in it,” he said. “How long was I in the dark, my lady?”
    â€œTen months.”
    â€œIt seemed longer.”
    â€œNo doubt because it was so congenial.”
    â€œYou should have stayed for the formal procession of the rats. Very entertaining; there were court dances. Although perhaps I imagined it in one of my hallucinations. I did have several vivid ones.”
    She reached across the table and wrapped her long, slender fingers around his hand. “You are safe now,” she told him. “And I will keep my eye on you, Lord Myrnin. The world cannot lose such a lovely head of hair.”
    â€œI will try to keep my hair, and my head, intact for you.” She’d kept her hand on his, and he turned his fingers to lightly grip hers. “I am surprised to find that you accept Amelie’s orders.”
    Lady Grey laughed. It was a peal of genuine amusement, too free for a well-bred young woman, but as she’d said, she’d buried that girl behind her. “Amelie asks favors of me. She doesn’t order me. I stay with you because I like you, Lord Myrnin. If you wish, I’ll stay with you today, as you rest. It might be a day of nightmares for you. I could comfort you.”
    The thought made him dizzy, and he struggled to contain it,control it. His brain was chattering again, running too fast and in too many wild directions. Perhaps he’d overindulged in the blood. He felt hot with it. “I think,” he said finally, “that you are too kind, and I am too mad, for that to end well, my lady. As much as I . . . desire comfort, I am not ready for it. Let me learn myself again before I am asked to learn someone else.”
    He expected her to be insulted; what woman would not have been, to have such a thing thrown in her face? But she only sat back, still holding his hand, and regarded him for a long moment before she said, “I think you are a very wise man, Myrnin of Conwy. I think one day we will find ourselves together again, and perhaps things will be different. But for now, you are right. You should be yourself, wholly, before you can begin to think beyond your skin again. I remember my first days of waking after death. I know how fragile and frightening it was, to be so strong and yet so weak.”
    She understood. Truly understood. He felt a surge of affection for her, and tender connection, and raised her hand to his lips to kiss the soft skin of her knuckles. He said nothing else, and neither did she. Then he bowed, rose, and walked to his own chambers.
    He bolted the door from within, and crawled still clothed between the soft linen sheets, drowning in feathers and fears, and slept as if the devil himself chased the world away.
    As he rode away that night in Amelie’s train of followers, he looked back to see Lady Grey standing like a beacon on the roof of the stone keep. He raised a hand to her as the trees closed around their party.
    He never saw her return the salute . . . but he felt it.
    Someday,
he heard her say.
Someday.
    â€¢Â Â Â â€¢Â Â Â â€¢
    He didn’t see her for another three hundred years. Wars had raged; he’d seen kingdoms rise and fall, and tens of thousands bleed to death in needless pain over politics and faith. He’d followed Amelie from one haven to the next, until they’d quarreled over something foolish, and he’d run away from her at last to strike out on his own. It was a mistake.
    He was never as good when left to his own devices.
    In Canterbury, in England, at a time when the young Victoria was only just learning the weight of her crown, he made mistakes. Terrible ones. The worst of these was trusting an