Alexander-Fyn-Sanguinarian

marry.” Raven looked her up and down.
    “Because I would insist upon seeing you naked every night.”
    Evangeline grabbed her dressing gown, pulling it on, and if she were honest she would admit she was grateful to be beside the fire and out of her damp clothes. She set about hanging everything up while Raven rang the bell beside the fire. Anticipating their needs, Munk entered the room within ten minutes, carrying a tray with hot, spiced wine and two glasses. The delicious aroma filled the big chamber.

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    “You can carry that to his lordship’s chamber, Munk,” she told the housekeeper. “He was just leaving.”
    “Leave it here, Munk. I will be staying with Miss Rutledge tonight. I don’t trust her not to do anything stupid.”
    “You can’t stay here. It’s not decent. You’ve already compromised me. We just barely saved my reputation.”
    “Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone I was here and neither will Munk, will you?” He looked at the housekeeper who smiled at him.
    “No, my lord, I won’t say a word.”
    Angry and helpless, Evangeline said, “He murdered that man who was here for dinner, Munk. I saw him dead. Go and look for yourself.”
    Munk drew herself upright, looking down at Evangeline. “The gentleman you are referring to left in a carriage some hours since, Miss Rutledge. You must be mistaken, if you’ll forgive my saying so.” With that the woman left, closing the door behind her.

    * * * *

    Raven was horrified with himself for taking blood from a corpse.
    Rory would be disgusted with him too if he knew. Blood is life-giving, Raven , he had once said, when teaching him the Rules of Community. Always receive blood from a living source. Always receive blood from a willing source. The blood of a dead thing, whether human or animal, has lost its life-affirming qualities. Blood from an unwilling source has no dignity and no love in it. Take only what is freely given and full of life. When the beast comes upon you, you must fight it with all your being.
    “I did not fight it. I gave in to it,” he whispered.
    “What are you talking about?” Raven passed Evangeline a glass of wine and she took it and drank, its warmth seeping visibly through her chilled body.
    “The beast.”

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    She climbed up onto the bed and tucked her feet underneath her to stay as far from him as possible . “ You are a beast.”
    “Yes, you are correct there, my child, I am. Tonight I behaved like a beast.”
    “You admit it? You killed that man, Shipman. He did not leave here in a carriage. You murdered him.”
    Raven nodded.
    “You killed him to drink his blood.”
    He pointed a long finger at her. “No, there you are wrong.”
    “I saw you with my own eyes!”
    “You saw me lap up some of his blood. I did not kill him just for that.”
    “You disgust me.” She shrank back still further on the bed.
    “And you get on my nerves,” he said. “Always accusing, never listening.” He put down his glass and was on the bed beside her in an instant. She screamed and tried to scramble away from him. Raven grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “That man was plotting against Queen Victoria. He wanted to murder her and her children to bring about a Republic of Britain.”
    “You found all that out over dinner this evening and decided to dispose of him for the sake of the empire?” she asked incredulously.
    “Why was he here in the first place? He was hardly your sort. Poetry indeed! You both had me fooled.”
    “You seemed to like him well enough, Miss. You were smiling at him all evening, laughing at his stupid jokes.”
    “Well, you had nothing amusing to say,” she stated. “He was pleasant company and I don’t believe he was plotting anything at all.
    You killed him to take his blood like the animal you are.”
    “You will listen to me you, foolish girl, you will listen. Now come to the fire and sit properly.” He snatched her from the bed and plumped her down in the chair. “Now,” he said, taking the other chair.
    “Hear me out.”
    “There is nothing you can say in your own defense, Lord 212
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    Ravenscroft, nothing.”
    Raven sipped his wine, watching her. She sat rigid, her eyes on the fire, a second glass of wine clutched in her hand.
    She hated him, when just this morning he had thought he was winning her over. She had not been afraid of him for a little while.
    She had opened her arms to him. Now that he had experienced the feeling