Immortals After Dark 12 - Lothaire

ideas,” Lothaire told Elizabeth, “know that she’ll heal you before you could die. But you’d experience agony as never before.”
    Elizabeth yanked her hand away from him, chin raised.
    “She’s a feral little human, isn’t she?” Hag said.
    “Elizabeth has not yet comprehended her place in the grand scheme of things.” He gave the girl a measured shove toward the kitchen counter. “Sit down, shut up, and touch nothing.”
    She hesitated before sitting on a barstool, still bristling.
    “What brings you here today?” Hag asked.
    “I’ve come for a potion. I need to clear my mind to get to my memories.” My Endgame is so close. Then he’d have everything he’d always wanted.
    Then I’ll finally understand the incomprehensible. . . .
    “I need to focus.” On something other than Elizabeth’s allure.
    Hag slanted doe-brown eyes at him. “Do you wish to discuss business in front of her?”
    He shrugged. “She’ll be gone soon. But she does need to eat until then.”
    Hag told her, “Go into the back room and look for a green chest decorated with leafy vines. Open the top and tell it whatever you wish to eat. Do not open the black chest decorated with spiderwebs.”
    When Elizabeth merely narrowed her eyes, Lothaire said, “Do as she commands. You should follow her orders just as you will mine.”
    Elizabeth rose with a huff, then sauntered into the back room. He heard a creaking hinge, then her enunciating, “Fun-yuns.”
    A second later in that country drawl: “Get the hell out!”
    Over his shoulder, he ordered, “Eat something nourishing .”
    After a rebellious pause, she said, “Blo-berry waff-els. May-pole see-rup.” Then she cried, “Hoo!” Excellent.
    She returned with a laden plate and silverware, sitting at the nearby dining table. Now that she’d regained her equilibrium, she acted unconcerned by all this, but he knew the wheels were turning, could see that calculating glint to her eyes.
    Yet I can’t predict what she’ll do.
    She cautiously took a bite of her breakfast, murmuring, “Oh, my God, that’s good.”
    Another bite, and another. She relished her meal in an almost sensual way. He wondered if she’d be like that in bed, savoring the taste of his skin. As I’d savor hers.
    Hag was telling him something and he wanted to concentrate, but he kept hearing Elizabeth’s fork on that plate, her little noises of enjoyment. He found himself rapt as she twirled a bite of waffle in syrup.
    “Are you enjoying your vittles ?” he grated to her.
    “Prison grub tastes like trench foot. So, yeah, you could say I’m liking this.” With a smug air, she added, “Plus, I’m enjoying the fact that I can do something you can’t.”
    “Can’t I?” He traced to the seat beside her.
    With a challenging lift of her brow, Elizabeth held up a forkful of waffle. “Wanna bite?”
    “You have no idea.”
    “Of waffle . Oh, but you’re a bloodsucker .” She gave an exaggerated frown.
    He found it imperative to wipe that look off the mortal’s face. Though he knew Hag was gazing at him in bafflement, he didn’t give a damn. He grasped Elizabeth’s wrist and took the bite.
    At once, his taste buds screamed wrong! He hadn’t masticated in ages and was clumsy with it, but eventually he could swallow the food.
    Elizabeth cast him a surprised half-grin. “You’ve got syrup on your lip. Here.” She licked her thumb and reached forward to smooth the syrup away.
    The air between them was electric as he debated tapping her wrist for a drink to wash it all down—
    Hag cleared her throat. “The ring , Lothaire?”
    Reluctantly, he rose. “You still haven’t seen it in visions?”
    She made room for him to sit at the counter, stowing a pile of what looked like bird skulls. “I’ve had no more luck than you. It’s hidden, with some very strong magics. Every time I try to uncover its location, I weaken my ability.”
    I can feel the mortal’s gaze still on me. Which meant he was having difficulty keeping his eyes off her. He shoved his fingers through his hair. “Can you aid my concentration?”
    “Possibly. But we have other concerns as well. La Dorada.”
    The Sorceri Queen of Evil. A few weeks ago, he’d located her slumbering in a hidden Amazonian tomb. She’d been half-dead, mummified for centuries in a sarcophagus, with the Ring of Sums on her thumb.
    Though she’d had protection spells attached to her, including one guaranteed to wake her, Lothaire had ripped off