“Yes, a girl’s night,” I say after a moment. “It’s good for Lenore to get out of the house.”
Wolf nods, pouring himself a drink. “You’re worried about her.”
I slowly turn the glass of scotch around in my hands, making the coaster with the Dark Eyes logo spin. “I don’t think she’s adapting very well.”
“You’re forgetting that she’s only a half-vampire and spent her whole life being raised as a human.”
“I’m not forgetting that,” I snap at him. “I was there. I saw her being raised.”
He raises a brow. “Then perhaps you’re forgetting that it’s a trying time for any vampire when they’re in The Becoming.” My gaze hardens but he goes on. “And yes, I know you aren’t like most of us. Believe me. But you’ve told me you don’t remember what it was like when Skarde turned you. You’ve forgotten.”
“Or I’ve blocked it out,” I say in a low voice.
“Either way, you don’t remember. But I do. It was fucking rough, even though I knew my whole life what was going to happen when I turned thirty-five. I saw the same thing happen to my sister when she turned twenty-one, then my brother and, it still didn’t prepare me. Now Lenore’s gone through that, without any warning, and neither of us know exactly how it is for her because we don’t have witch blood. I think she’s adapting as well as she can, old boy.”
I sigh. “I know. She is. But I’m still worried. Her body is adjusting but her mind…her heart. I’m not sure she’s cut out for this lifestyle. She’s too…soft.”
“She is,” he says, after he has a drink. “But that’s why you’re in love with her. Because all you’ve known are centuries of life being hard and sharp.”
And relentless. The years have been relentless.
“I love her in ways I don’t understand,” I say quietly, looking off at nothing in particular.
I feel Wolf’s eyes on me in surprise, silence falling between us. Though vampires are fairly emotional and expressive by nature, I’ve never been one to talk much, especially about something as personal as my relationship with Lenore. Perhaps her softness is rounding my edges.
I’m not sure I like it. I need to stay hard, in more ways than one.
“Well,” Wolf says after a moment, clearing his throat, “if it makes you feel any better, I don’t think love is something even humans understand, let alone us. It might be for the best to let it remain a mystery.” I finish my drink and he leans across the bar, pouring me another one. “And I wouldn’t worry about Lenore either. She’ll come into her own eventually. It just might take time.”
“I know. But then why does it feel like time is something we’re running out of?” I ask, unable to ignore the dark feeling that’s been nagging at me ever since the incident with Yanik. “I’m so painfully aware of the seconds, minutes, hours, days when I’m with her, like time is now limited, no longer infinite.”
“Maybe it’s because we don’t know how immortal she is,” he points out. “We both know that we can live forever—if we choose to, and only if we’re careful. We don’t know how it is with a half-witch, half-vampire. How much can her body handle? There are three ways to kill us, how many to kill her? And even without that, how long will she naturally live for? A hundred years? A couple hundred?”
Lenore has asked these questions herself, to which none of us have any answers. Human-vampire hybrids can live a long time, like my brother Kaleid, for example, who was the first born vampire to my father. Over time, his human side disappeared. But he’s also an exception. Most direct hybrids don’t live forever and they’re easier to kill. My brother excels because of my father’s blood. Blood that was created by the Devil himself, the same blood that runs in me.
“Maybe that’s it,” I muse. “Or maybe it’s that we’re waiting for the other shoe to drop. With my father. You know he won’t take what she did lightly.”
Wolf breaks into a grin. “Oh, to have been a fly in that room when he found out how little Lenore bested his Dark Order. In flames.” Then his brows furrow. “But you know he can’t leave his homeland.”
“Can’t? Or won’t? Two different things, Wolf. And regardless, whoever—or whatever—he sends here next will be far, far worse than Yanik.”
He shrugs. “I’ll be ready for them. So will you.”
“But will Lenore?”
“I wouldn’t underestimate her, Solon. That was your father’s mistake.”
He might be right, but that doesn’t stop me from worrying. God damnit, I’m not cut out for this sentimental shit.
Suddenly my nose fills with the smell of aniseed and Wolf gives me a sharp nod. Onni is here.
He strides across the club to the backdoor and opens it. After their first visit, vampires get a key card that will give them access through the parking lot at the back of the house, but they still have to knock to come inside. They must be invited in.