Michael Lord, one of the Literati, approached, buttoning up the jeans he’d dropped on the platform before he’d transformed. He paused a few feet away, staring at the woman in his arms in opened-mouthed awe.
“No, don’t—” Blaise uttered harshly, but too late. Michael strode forward and placed his hand on the woman’s upper arm.
He flinched back in pain.
Aubrey grabbed Michael’s hand and examined the reddening palm, looking alarmed and interested at once. Fear could never completely diminish Aubrey’s vast scientific curiosity. Blaise craned to see what Aubrey examined.
A small blister broke the surface of Michael’s palm. Michael appeared to be in no great pain or distress, merely confused about what had just happened.
“He’ll be all right,” Aubrey declared, releasing Michael’s hand. “It’s a small burn, almost as if the woman was radioactive to him. The burn is already healing, given Michael’s nature,” Aubrey said, referring to Michael’s sta
tus as one of the Literati. Near immortality and the ability to heal rapidly were only two of the Literati’s inhuman powers. The humans Morshiel embraced might transform into bloodthirsty, foul Scourge revenants. On the rare occasions throughout the centuries when Blaise had embraced a human, however, the man retained the nobility of his human spirit and gained the savage grace of the wolf.
“Why did you do that?” Blaise growled at Michael. “She might have destroyed you.”
Michael flushed and looked downward, showing him only the crown of his chestnut brown hair.
“Don’t blame him too harshly,” Aubrey said. “He did what any of us would do. She beckons like a magnet to Literati blood. She’s like a fountain of vitessence that would never run dry.”
Blaise’s nostrils flared in anger when he noticed Aubrey’s hungry stare on the female. Maybe Michael’s impulsiveness wasn’t for naught. Better the Literati knew the truth. Nature had given the woman some form of protection from immortal hunger.
“Do you think she can harm the Literati from a distance?” he asked Aubrey.
Aubrey shook his head. “No, you shouldn’t take my analogy of radioactivity too far. Only touching her will cause cellular damage at the site of contact,” his gaze flickered curiously over Blaise’s hands cupping the woman’s hip and waist, “at least for most of us.”
A strange sense of satisfaction tore through Blaise, twining with his bewilderment over the fact that he could touch the woman. He was as soulless as the Literati, whom he had turned immortal to save from the ravages of the bubonic plague. He was as soulless as the revenants Morshiel daily created through murder by excessive blood drinking. He was as damned as Morshiel himself.
But he could touch her.
“Spread the word among the Literati that it is forbidden to touch her.”
Aubrey nodded.
“Find out who she is,” Blaise told Michael. “The more information we have, the better. Morshiel won’t rest until he has her once again.” Michael nodded, seeming relieved that Blaise was willing to move past his earlier impulsiveness. Blaise glanced at Aubrey. “Send out a scouting party to see if they can catch Morshiel’s scent. Bring the crystal to Sanctuary. Protect it, Aubrey,” he added under his breath. “It provides more vitessence than blood. It won’t take Morshiel long to recover from his wound and decide to reclaim it.”
“And the woman?” Aubrey asked.
“She has my protection.”
Aubrey nodded. Michael gave the woman one last glance of incredulous longing before he stared once again at his reddened palm.
“Fool,” Blaise muttered under his breath.
He walked down the platform toward the dark tunnel in the distance, refusing to look into his captive’s face. If he did, he’d turn into as much a fool as Michael.
If he did, he might never look away.
Chapter Two
Margaret Turrow, his human housekeeper, turned when he entered the bedroom.
“Keep your voice down,” she warned with a glare.
Blaise curled the side of his upper lip in a menacing gesture. It didn’t mean anything. It was just a habit. He still snarled at Margaret, even after she’d been in his service twenty-eight years. True, a quarter of a century was nothing to him, but sometimes it seemed he’d known Margaret as long as he’d known Aubrey. The woman deserved his respect, if only for the fact that she’d put up with him for all that time. The Literati had good reason to be wary of Blaise’s dark moods, but Margaret knew for a fact she could do nearly whatever she pleased in Sanctuary and Blaise would only bark at her for her impertinence before he let her do whatever she wanted.
Most of the time, anyway.
He walked around the four-poster bed where Margaret sat. He hadn’t seen the woman when he entered because the posts were draped in a white diaphanous fabric, blocking his vision. She lay on the amber silk sheets completely nude with the exception of the two elbow-length black gloves.