Summoning Shadows: A Rosso Lussuria Vampire Novel (24 page)

“And what is that, vampire?” she asked, sounding perversely amused.

“My self-respect,” I said. “Inanna allowed Ereshkigal to strip her of material things, for she knew it was the only way to descend into her sister’s kingdom,” I said. “And you seem to forget that slaying Inanna was not easy for Ereshkigal. It has always seemed to me that the two were bound. Ereshkigal grieved when the judges of the Underworld ordered her to execute Inanna. For three days, Inanna’s corpse hung from a hook in the Great Below, and during that time, Ereshkigal howled in endless pain. You have bound us, Great Siren. I walk into your Underworld knowing that we are one and the same now.”

Morina growled and turned me, gripping both my wrists in one of her hands as she opened a door at the base of the hall. She shoved me through it and into a private dungeon, but she did not release me. She guided me toward the back wall. I had time to glimpse the shackles hanging there before she spun me around to face her.

“Then,” she said, her breath moist against my cheek, “shall I do this properly?”

She grabbed a handful of white lace at the front of the gown and tore. The cloth hissed, giving way to her strength as if she tore paper. Strip by strip, she peeled the gown from my body, leaving my skin naked and bare to the dank air. When she raised that one crimson eye to look at me, I did not cower.

“And so, I am brought low, once again. Does it please you, my captor, my sweet Ereshkigal?”

Morina kept that one eye focused on my face, pieces of the gown fallen like ruined petals at my feet. She took my wrists in her hands, and when she raised them, I didn’t struggle. The line of her body pressed against mine as she shackled me. The first shackle clicked shut, hard and uncomfortable against my skin.

“Stop talking to me like that.”

“Does it displease you so, Great Siren, to be spoken to with such respect?”

Morina growled but ignored my mocking. She reached up to shackle my other wrist, and the movement put the skin of her collarbone close to my face.

Oddly encouraged, I inhaled deeply and the scent of her hit me like leather and night blooming jasmine.

Morina pressed my wrist into the rough stone and went stock-still. I turned my face into the bend of her neck and though I did not touch her, I could feel the ghostly beat of her pulse against my lips.

“What are you doing?” she asked and her voice was still a growl, but a breathy one. I wiggled against the wall and as if it was nothing more than reflex to her, Morina pressed her hips to my naked stomach in effort to pin me and keep me from moving. If she meant to abate my wriggling, it did not stop me entirely. She put her weight on my wrist until a jagged stone bit into my skin and I felt the first trickle of blood.

Morina’s breath against my hair came short and clipped. Her sex stiffened against me. A thread of desire unwound between us. I wasn’t sure if it was her desire or mine that I felt. In some part of me, some distant part unrelated to empathy, I felt mildly appalled that my body reacted so strongly.

But in another part of me, a part of me that seemed much closer to the surface, that unraveling thread sent all other thoughts floating away like a leaf in a flood.

I kissed her neck lightly, and her entire body strung rigid in resistance. I tried to slip my hand from between her grip and the wall, but she didn’t budge. I rested my head against the wall, though my lips ached to kiss her. If I had thought she would not withdraw, I would have. But I knew whatever was happening, it was a delicate dance and I had to tread cautiously.

Morina’s eye was closed, and even in the dark, the patch was a striking contrast against her skin. Her features around the patch were tightly drawn, as if in pain. Her lips pressed together and a muscle in her jaw twitched.

I shifted my hips, making my stomach move against her again, and this time, a shudder went through her. Her eye opened, and she quickly shut the last shackle about my wrist.

“Clever,” she breathed against my cheek, “but not clever enough. I’ll not be seduced, vampire.”

“You chose me for a reason, Morina.”

I could still feel her arousal against my belly. “I chose you because you are
her
lover.”

“No,” I said. “Not just that. You chose me because I remind you of yours.”

Morina hissed and pulled away from me. When I blinked, she was gone and the lock on the cell door clicked shut behind her.

You’re playing a dangerous hand, Piph.

I’m playing the only one I have.

A merry tune woke me from my slumber. I pushed aside the covers and retrieved my slippers and shawl, guided by the sound as I made my way down the staircase. My brother Tristain sat on the floor near the fireplace playing a small stringed instrument that had been my gift to him for his natal day. He fumbled, plucking the wrong note, and attempted to recover from his mishap by singing a bawdy song over it. Our family encouraged him, yelling out suggestions, clicking their tongues, and slapping their knees in a din of revelry.

“Well!” Tristain stopped playing when he caught sight of me on the last steps of the stairs. “There’s the sleeping beauty now! Planned to sleep the day away, did you?”

“With all this racket? Hardly.” I smiled sleepily before I went to the window to peer outside.

“Your beast’s not yet come, dear sister. We’ve seen neither hide nor hair of him.”

Him
, they thought. And why not? It was far easier for them to believe that the
creature
I was bedding was a man, at the least. Thankful though they were when the Dracule had come, they were more grateful they weren’t the ones in my position.

“Honestly, Andrella,” my sister said, “you seem to have grown an unusual fondness for the
thing
.”

“Hush, child.” My mother scolded her. She took me by the hand and led me from the room. “Do not listen to her,” she said. “She is young and stupid. She doesn’t know what you have sacrificed to protect your family, Andrella.” Her features were drawn in sympathy. She patted my hand, as if trying to console me.

“You really don’t understand, do you, Mother?”

“What do you mean, Andrella?”

“It’s not so great a sacrifice,” I said, taking my hand away from hers when we made it to Father’s study. “I never intended to marry, not as Camilla does. And the beast you deem so monstrous, is not a monster at all to me.”

“You’re delusional, child. Do you hear what you’re saying?”

“Yes, Mother. I know what I’m saying, and no, I haven’t lost my mind. I’ve never been like you, like any of you.” This time, it was I who took her hands. I cradled them between us. “I’m leaving, Mother.”

“With the
beast
?” She looked at me in horror and shock.

I sighed. “I knew this wouldn’t be easy. I love you dearly, but I cannot stay here.”

I would pack and be ready tonight, and when Morina came, I would ask her to take me away. I had been thinking of it for weeks and now, after so much thought, I had steeled myself against the nerves and inevitable protest of my family.

I remembered her in the gardens, her skin reflecting the moonlight. Her eyes like beautiful red roses with black veins. I had never expected it to happen. I had never anticipated falling in love with her. Now, when I thought of her, I remembered that night in the gardens and it felt as though my heart would burst.

I had known then, after we had made love under the blanket of stars, that I felt the stirring of love in my breast.

“You’re mad.”

“No,” I said. “I’m in love.”

I embraced my mother briefly. “I am sorry, Mama, but this is what I want. This is the way it must be.”

She scowled and did not return my embrace.

I shook my head sadly. They had never understood, nor would they ever. I was nothing more than a tool, an instrument, no different than the one Tristain played.

I left to pack my things.

“Tristain!” My mother’s voice called from study. “Tristain!”

My brother’s large frame appeared in the hallway before I could reach the staircase.

“She’s mad, Tristain!” I heard my mother’s hurried steps behind me as she called my brother. “Tristain, she is going to leave us! She is going to leave us for that
thing
!”

“You must be jesting?” he asked.

“Step aside, Tristain.”

He did not.

“I said step aside.” I raised my hand, the power unfurling from within me. The sconces in the hallway extinguished.

“No, sister.”

I drew my hand back, feeling the magic pool in the center of my palm like warm honey. I flung it outward toward Tristain, and something heavy hit the back of my head, sending the world rolling in darkness.

*

I jolted back to myself in my cell. The shackles clanged above me and I cried out as they bit into my wrists. I felt as if I were losing my mind.

“Andrella,” I whispered, recalling the dream. Though I knew it wasn’t a dream, of course.

“
Vampires do not dream
.”

Movement in the corner of the cell caught my attention. The same woman I had seen some nights ago stepped away from the wall. Again, she was garbed in a gown of flowing white.

“Am I in vision again?” I asked.

“
Yes. In a manner.”

“Where’s Cuinn?”

Down here. Where the hell else would I be?

Cuinn moved, and I felt the weight of his fur against my bare feet.

I kicked him lightly, and he grumbled.

“So you were going to run away with her?”

Andrella nodded, though she looked troubled. “
Yes.
”

“What happened after you were attacked?”

Andrella spread her arm out, indicating the cell around us. “
The same unfortunate thing that has happened to you.
”

“Your family wasn’t like you?”

“
Witches?
” she asked, coming closer. “
No
.
They both feared and relished my power. And because of that, they didn’t want me to leave with her.
”

“How?” I asked. “How did you meet her?”

Andrella tilted her head to the side, appearing as real and solid as Cuinn.

“
My family thought it happenstance, but I summoned her. I wanted out
,” she said. “
In the beginning, that was all it was. Morina knew that, but somewhere, somehow…
” Andrella shrugged. “
We fell in love.
”

“Why show me that particular memory?”

“Because, empath, if anyone can understand, it is you. Morina is not always as she has been. What you see now is nothing more than a shadow of the woman she was.
”

“Then why not show me who she was?” I asked. “Why show me the memory you just did?”

“
I want you to understand what I was willing to risk for her
.”

I felt like she was offering tidbits of information, breadcrumbs for me to follow. It wasn’t enough.

“If you want me to understand, I need to know more. You didn’t die at your family’s hands. I already know that.”

“
No,
” she said, that one word a soft whisper. “
The men that attacked us here, that was unforeseeable. Morina has hunted every single one of them
to avenge my death. Yet, she still blames herself
.”

“Why? If it was unforeseeable, why? How could she blame herself?”

Andrella averted her gaze. “
When I asked Morina to take me away, she was not ready with an answer. I fooled my family into believing that I no longer had any association with her whatsoever, that they had ‘cleansed the devil out of me.’
” She sighed and my heart ached for her, for whatever she must have gone through. “
But when she came, she was not sure of us. She was not sure of herself. She was not sure of a witch and a Dracule. That is why she blames herself, vampire, and blames others for her loss. She blames herself because she left me, and by the time she had decided, it was too late
.
She blames others because she cannot deal with her own guilt.
”

“You could have run away without her,” I said.

“
I could have, but I did not want to
.” Andrella came close to me and the air felt colder, though, as a vampire, I should not have been able to feel the cold. She touched my cheek tenderly, her fingers icy and real. “
You can save her from herself, vampire. That is why she chose you.”

My eyes stung with unshed tears and my heart ached as if it would never cease. “I don’t know how.”

“
You will find a way.
”

“I miss my home, Andrella. I miss those I love. I want to get out of here. How am I supposed to show compassion to the one that has brought this hell on me?”

“
Do you know how Inanna made it through the Underworld?
” she asked.

“How?”