“There’s a difference,” he says, glancing at me, his tone serious. “If you can be in a place like Dark Eyes, or if you can find a human to feed off, with consent, then there’s no need to kill. And if you do kill, well, you better cover it up. We all make mistakes and get carried away.” He shrugs, as if it’s no big deal, but judging by all the skulls in his storage locker, I’d say otherwise. “But to do it for fun, wasting blood, being sloppy, that’s murder.”
“Why can’t vampires feed off each other? We can.”
“They can, they just won’t be fulfilled in the same way. It’s like a bad diet versus a healthy one. As for us, you’re not full vampire, Lenore. I feed off your human side. And your human side feeds off me.”
“Yin and yang,” I say, rolling down the window to ash. Despite the cigarettes in the car, I’m certain Solon keeps this car as clean-smelling as possible. Old cigarette smell is gross for normal people, for us it’s probably unbearable.
“Or the Ouroboros,” he says in a low voice.
I ponder that for a moment, picturing a snake eating its own tail, a symbol very common in my studies.
Studies.
Fuck.
I hadn’t even thought about school since I finished that last exam and…well became a vampire witch.
“What happened?” he asks me, taking the car onto Masonic Ave. “Your energy just changed.”
I appreciate him not reading my thoughts for once. “Was just reminded of school, that’s all,” I tell him, giving him a somewhat melancholy smile. “It all feels like a dream.” And my future is so murky.
“The Ouroboros started in Egypt, correct?” he asks. “When we get to the bar you’ll have to tell me all about it. Pretend I’m some handsome fraternity boy you’re propositioning.”
I burst out laughing. “Solon, are you role-playing with me already?”
He just grins and guns it down the street.
We park a block away from The Cloister and start walking, and I’m getting both nervous and sad. Nervous because I haven’t been out in public around people in a while and it’s been a week since I last had any blood. I’m not craving it and I feel totally in control, having ate food earlier. But still.
And sad because I’m thinking about Elle. Last time I was here, I was with her. She was alive and my world was completely different.
But I didn’t have Solon. So there’s that. I just wish I could have kept both him and her in my life. I’m certain she would have warmed up to him eventually.
The bouncer at The Cloister is the same as always, giving us both peculiar looks until Solon starts compelling him and he lets us in. At thirty-eight in human years, Solon is by far the oldest in this place, and when we enter the bar, every head turns to look at us.
“Not as inconspicuous as I had hoped,” I say under my breath.
Solon gives the air a distasteful sniff. “God, it smells awful in here.”
I roll my eyes even though I have to agree with him. It smells like stale booze, B.O., and blood with too much alcohol in it.
Thankfully, because it’s early we’re able to snag a two-person bench, both seats beside each other, and Solon orders us dirty martinis since I told him that’d be the only drink in here that he’ll find acceptable.
“This is kind of nice, isn’t it?” I tell him, putting my hand on his thigh. “Our first date.”
He glances down at me, eyes dancing. “This is our first date?”
Suddenly I feel my cheeks go pink and I look down at my drink. “I guess.”
Oh shit, why did I assume we were dating? With all the sex and the blood-sucking and the living in the same house and the fact that I’m in love with him, I don’t really know what our relationship is. It’s undefinab
le. Is dating too much or is it not enough?
“Lenore,” he says softly. “Look at me.”
I glance up at him through my lashes.
“We’re whatever you want us to be,” he says to me, staring deep into my eyes for emphasis. “No matter what, you are mine for the ages.”