“Very well.”
“This is getting too complicated,” Sebastian says quietly. “Please, can you just do it yourself from now on?”
“You know why I can’t do that. I intend to keep the promise I made to myself, if nothing else, until the end of time.”
“But she won’t know. Just take the burden off me.”
“I can’t, ‘Bastian, I’m sorry. If she ever did find out about my Power and I never told her, she would always wonder if I had used it on her. I have too much to lose.”
“So do I!” he shouts. “You are her sire. Chances are she would forgive you at some point. If she finds out what I have been doing to her, she would never forgive me. She has no cause to, and I have a lot to lose as well.”
“I need you, ‘Bastian. I need you to do this for me,” he says soothingly.
“So, you keep your hands clean and leave me flapping in the wind?”
“No, I wouldn’t let that happen. But yes, you’re right, I need to keep my hands clean.”
I am shocked at this exchange. Not only are they are speaking of me as if I am some toy to be fought over but they are talking about spelling me. And what is the deal with Sebastian’s switch in temper? And CK has Powers? What is all that about? I am vaguely aware that I am dreaming and that I have dreamed, at least some of this, before. I am seriously paranoid. I can’t listen to any more of this. I turn to glide away and bump straight into Remiel.
“You,” I snarl. “I might have known you would have something to do with this.”
“I am merely here to make sure you are listening to what they plot. I have nothing to do with the content.”
I brush past him after casting a critical eye over him. He is dressed up in some garb that makes him look like a Prussian General. “Been reading again?” I indicate his dress and he looks down at himself. “Whatever do you mean? I like this look. Very dignified.?
?
“Whatever,” I grouse as I float back down the corridor towards my bedroom as he follows on foot. “Go away,” I say to him.
“Not yet. I have been trying to get you to see for ages now that you can’t trust your sire. He is having Sebastian influence you. Your will is strong but his is stronger. You have no idea who he is, and he will succeed if you allow this to continue.”
“No, this is a lie. I do know who he is. This is just something you have made up to mess with me.” I try and speed up my floating but to no avail, I am just slowly inching my way down the corridor and I can’t get away from him.
“No messing. Although that is fun. I do quite enjoy our time together.”
“If this is true, why are you showing me? What do you get out of it?” I ask.
“Two less people in my way.”
I have no idea what he means so I just stare at him. “I am quite certain that you wouldn’t care to continue with your relationships with either of them, if you knew what they were doing to you. You would cut them off and as I said, two less people in my way.”
“Your way to what?” I ask through gritted teeth as I don’t seem to be going anywhere now. I am just wafting about like some sort of ghost. I don’t even have feet which is most disconcerting.
“To getting what I want,” he says easily.
“Which is what? Me in your little fantasy world?”
“The bigger picture,” he says, and my eyes flutter open.
Chapter 22
I sit up suddenly and CK says, “Aefre?”
I turn to him, sitting right where he was when I fell asleep. He is covered in papers and he doesn’t look like he has moved, so he can’t have gone up to the Tower to speak to Sebastian. Can he?
“Weird dream,” I say, and he looks concerned.
“The Thirteen kind?”