I shake my head, wondering how she can deal with all of this.
“You said sometimes,” I comment. “What else is it used for?”
“The volunteers,” she says, frowning. “They didn’t tell you about them?”
“No,” I say, wondering what else there is I don’t know. A ton, probably.
“The volunteers are humans,” she says. “It’s how I started. Well, I brought a friend here about six years ago. She was obsessed with vampires, she heard stories about this place. Rumors. She made friends with Ezra, and the next thing I knew I was accompanying her to the house.” She pauses. “I had to wait outside. But my friend went in.”
A chill runs through me. Other humans know about this place and willingly come here? Then again, given the history of this place, I shouldn’t be surprised. I’m certain now that’s what Anton LeVey and Manson were probably doing here too.
“What do they do in there?”
“They give their blood. The vampires are the ones that go in the chains, though. It gives the humans control, keeps the vamps from going mental with bloodlust. A lot of people have fetishes when it comes to blood play or getting bitten. They get to indulge those fetishes and the vampires get to feed.” She tilts her head as she looks at me. “If you didn’t have Solon, that’s where you’d go. Better than killing people on the street, am I right?”
I nod, and then sigh loudly. “Well, I’m sure I’ll be down there soon.” Even though the idea of feeding off a stranger, a human no less, gives me the creeps.
There’s a knock at the door and Amethyst answers it, smiling at her mom as she takes a tray of tea.
The door closes and she brings the tray over to me, putting it on the coffee table. It smells heavenly, in a porcelain pot, with shortbread cookies beside it. I didn’t think I’d ever be hungry for food again, but my stomach growls. It also reminds me of drinking tea and eating cookies in my parent’s kitchen, and my heart pangs for the innocence of the years past, innocence I’ll never get back.
Amethyst pulls up a velvet ottoman and sits across from me. “My mom made the cookies herself. You better eat them since the vampires don’t eat as much food as they should, and I eat too many sweets as it is.”
I reach for a cookie and nibble on the end of it, unsure how my stomach will react after all that blood. Like I’ve discovered with all the food I’ve had lately, I can pick up on every single ingredient, down to the specific type. It’s pretty amazing, though it can make food overwhelming. Thankfully, these cookies are simple and delicious.
“I’m sure with you being half witch, you won’t have to drink blood that often anyway,” Amethyst says. “And that’s what Solon’s there for. You won’t be in the Dark Room.”
“I don’t think so,” I say, trying to catch the crumbs from my mouth. “We had a fight.”
She raises a perfectly groomed brow. “A fight? With Solon?”
I frown. “That doesn’t happen?”
Her lips curl with amusement. “No. I mean, it happens. But everyone basically does what he tells them to do.”
“Alpha of the house, huh.”
“Yeah. And they’re all alphas, so it’s a handful. But he rules the roost. He rules most of the city, to be honest.”
“I got that impression earlier,” I say, thinking of the waiter at the restaurant.
“So why do you think you’re fighting with him?”
I look down at the tea, avoiding her eyes. “Oh. Uh. I got…carried away.”
“With feeding?”
“Yeah…”
“That’s what he wants from you. He’s fine.”
“Well, that, and uh…he was naked and I was naked and…”
She stares at me, waiting for me to spell it out.
I exhale. “This has never happened to me before, but I guess I was a little handsy and out-of-control and he told me to stop and when I didn’t…”
I close my eyes, feeling gross and ashamed and I probably shouldn’t be telling Amethyst, a girl I don’t even know, the intimate, personal details of what happened.