Winterly (Dark Creatures Book 1), стр. 116
He lifted a brow. “Where does madam wish to begin?”
“Tell me why you haven’t destroyed the Horeb Blades. Why suffer such a thing to exist if it has the power to kill you?”
He shrugged. “To remind us that even we antediluvian beasts are not truly omnipotent or everlasting; change is terrible and inevitable and all things must die some way or another, whether cyclic or permanent—day must give way to night; but death is not without rebirth.”
Emma nodded and for a time they were silent. “You saved my life…like you tried to save Cleopatra’s. I know that now.”
“Yes. I dared to love her; I tried to save her. I tried to draw the poisoned blood out of her heart; she was too far gone. In the end, all I attained was my own downfall, and the curse of drinking blood for all eternity. She took her own life and with it she took whatever light I once possessed.”
Emma could see, even now, how he’d roared and wept over the cradled body of his beloved queen. How he’d brought his fists down upon the bowl of poison she’d consumed, splintering it as completely as his wrecked heart; she’d seen how his tears had left bloody streaks down his nacreous flesh. “Yes,” she said, “I saw it all.”
“My dark secret love destroyed her life as it nearly destroyed yours.” Suddenly he looked as old as he was, stooped by the weight of time and memories. “Ironic, is it not? Destroying the very thing you love—seems a very mortal thing to do.”
“Markus, who sent the snake?” She rubbed her bandaged chest, thankful to be rid of that necrotic web of poisoned blood. “What is witch venom?”
“Each witch has a familiar—Tanith’s is the white snake that bit you.”
Emma shuddered, recalling the albino eyes and jaundiced white scales. “But Ana—”
“She’s as sorcerous and venomous as her sisters. But even their combined power is nothing to their father’s.”
“And who is their father?”
“You have met him already.”
Her mouth parted in surprise. “Not…”
“Malach.”
“But he’s…” What? Too young to have grown daughters? They were immortals, for pity’s sake. “Never mind I—”
“Their sire and their husband.”
She gasped, horrified.
He laughed. “Ironic that they should vilify me for having sired Victoria to be my lover, but at least my sister is not blood of my loins.”
Emma held her hand up, nauseated. “Yes, thank you.”
He grasped her hand and kissed it. “If I sired you tonight, would you think me a father?”
“Heavens, no!” And there would be no siring whatever.
He nodded, satisfied. “Like Gabriel and I, Malach too was once of Heaven—a Cardinal watcher. A brother.” His eyes darkened. “It was his blade you nearly sheathed in my heart. I found it in the armchair while you slept.”
“You tested me then?” Guilt and ire instantly warmed her chest.
“I had to know, Emma. When you would not take the goblet…I suspected.”
“And I failed your test.”
“Not entirely,” he replied, his tone like gravel. “I am alive after all.”
“It seems we dark creatures have much still to learn about one another.” Emma pushed the sheets away and held her hands out to him. When he placed himself beside her, she said, “I think you fear love, Markus, because you do not know what it is to be loved; your queen loved you no better than she loved the men that sired her children. But I love only you and no other—I never will love another.”
She gave him no chance to doubt her, for she fixed tight arms behind his neck and pressed her lips hungrily to his. With tender kisses, she proceeded to show him just how much she loved his darkness.
Chapter Fifty-Four
Maleficium
The flame weltered as the night breathed its dark musk into the room through the open window. Emma glutted her senses on the feel and taste of Markus, breathed deeply the wild heather and oak moss that clung to his hair and skin.
With light touches, he began a slow tour down her ribs, his fingertips tarrying over her breasts. Her breathing became shallow. She arched into him as he sucked her bottom lip between his sharp teeth with a teasing nip. Chuckling softly, he gently unfettered her fingers from his hair and locked them firmly either side of her restive hips like manacles. He brushed his nose and lips over her throat and down her sternum. Her nails gouged the mattress, her body writhed against the force of her lust, and her teeth drew blood where his had only grazed her lip.
Markus glanced up, his eyes blackening as he watched her tongue gloss the blood across her lips. Slowly, he pressed his mouth against hers. The dark arrangement of copper and salt lingered between them like the last fading notes of a cello. He broke the kiss only to transfer his assiduities to her abdomen.
Mesmeric shadows danced around their bower of black pillars and blood red silk. She closed her eyes and allowed her fingers to glide along the taut veins and iron feathers of his tucked wings, then up again into his inky hair, thick and warm and fragrant. With thirstful strokes, Markus availed himself of every inch of her as though she was bathed in nectar. Unexpectedly, he ceased his caresses with a heart-heavy sigh and rested his forehead on her birthmark.
“What is it?” she asked.
“You are distracting me abominably.” Amusement lit his eyes as she pulled herself up onto her elbows, her brows knit in consternation. “Do not look at me like that, Emmaline, you are testing my restraint. We vampyres have little enough of it, you know.”
“You are no vampyre.”
Up went a black brow. “Unless you are wroth with me, then I am swiftly relegated to vampyre once more.”
She sagged back onto the bed with a sigh. “As