“Well, I'm really glad to hear that, Ara.” The table huffed at such an informal address, but Nathan didn't even notice. “I know he was pretty in love with you.”
I nodded. “Yeah. He was.”
“I'm sorry he’s dead. He was a good friend of mine.” He looked down at his plate.
“So, who turned you?” Morgaine asked, looking around Falcon, down the long line of vampires on her side of the table.
“Yeah,” I added. “David told me once it wasn't him.”
Nathan looked at Arthur, then at Eric. “I uh…I don't know.”
“Oh.” I looked down. “So, you didn't see the guy?”
He shrugged. “Could’ve been a girl, for all I know.”
A few others shot questions at Nathan, while I looked at Mike. Him, with all his rules, was the last person I ever expected to see texting under the table. “Mike?”
He looked at me.
“Who are you…?” I nodded to the phone.
“Em,” he said quietly.
“Oh. Did you tell her about Nathan?”
He nodded and held up his phone.
All I saw was exclamation marks, then laughed. “Guess she’s happy then?”
“Uh, yeah, just a tad.” He leaned forward and stuffed his phone in his back pocket.
“You okay?” I asked, patting his hand.
“Yeah. You?” he breathed, forcing a smile.
I swallowed. “David's Emily.”
“Look, I kind of knew it was like that,” he said. “And I think you did, too. Doesn't mean anything, baby.”
I nodded. “I know. It was just a shock to hear it put that way.”
He patted my hand with his other one. “I know. I just feel sorry for…you know who. I bet they”—by they, he meant David— “are gonna cop an earful when you see them next.”
I laughed. “Probably not. I can never stay mad at hi—er, her when we’re in the same room.”
Mike laughed. “I’ve always loved that about you.”
The training hall seemed cold without the heat of fifty bodies filling it. Mike fitted a metal cuff to his forearm and winked at me as he grabbed a sword.
“Why do we need protection?” I rubbed the cuff on my arm. “We’re vampires. We won’t die from a cut.”
“No, but do you have any idea how much energy it uses to heal a slash every ten seconds? That energy—that blood—is better spent cutting up bad guys on the battlefield, Ar.”
“Oh.” I shoved a finger under it to scratch my skin. “Makes sense. But, I was kind of wondering, and…I know this is probably a really stupid question, so don't get mad, okay?”
“Sure, baby, what is it?” He jammed a sword into his scabbard.
“If…if we’re strong enough to cut vampires open with a butterknife, why do we need Lilithian steel blades? I thought that was just so humans could cut them.”
“Because,” he said, handing me a sword from the table. “To cut them with plain iron would, again, take more effort, and the chances of cutting deep enough to bleed them out and let the venom tip do its trick are one in five. Lilithian steel guarantees the best possible result.”
“Is their skin really that tough?”
Mike smirked, sighing heavily. “You just have no idea about anything, do you, girl?”
I swallowed with a little gulp. He was right. I hadn't really thought about any of this. I guess I just took it for granted that I was a vampire and so were they—that we’d all just do some biting and waving of swords until someone wore out and went home.
“Come on then.” Mike lowered into his stance, his eager grin drawing me into battle. “Let’s do this.”
I twisted my sword over, holding it in a dagger grip, then extended my arm, my fist aimed at Mike, the blade of my sword following the length of my forearm.
“Ara, you’re holding that wrong. Point your blade upward, like this.” He showed me how one is supposed to hold a sword.
I shook my head. “I have my own style. It’s non-conventional, Mike, but this works for me.”
He scoffed, shaking his head.
“It does. Just watch.”
“Fine,” he said, and his deep, godly tone made me not so sure of myself. “We’ll see.”
I angled my wrist and dipped my arm, waving my blade through the air in a figure eight, then dropped my shoulder, flipping onto my back as Mike stepped in. The ground caught me with a jolt, but it wasn’t enough to wind me. I grabbed his ankle while he was still looking for me in his line of direct sight, and slashed his shin—bringing him down to the ground beside me. He hit hard, dropping his blade with a loud clunk, and I was on him, legs either side of his chest, my sword to his throat. “Yield?”
He coughed, laughing, his face red with obvious pain, and held my hips with both hands. “Girl one. Guy nothing.”
I laid my sword on the floor beside us. “Still think I need to hold my sword ‘properly’?”
He knocked my hands down from their sarcastic pose of ‘quotation marks’ and dragged me into his chest for a bear-tight hug. “You’re fine, baby. You hold that sword however you want—long as you fight like that.”
I smiled into his sweaty neck, feeling the short, gristly stubble along his hairline behind his ear. It felt good to be this close to him again—like we’d not hugged in so long. He let me free, and I sat up, looking down at the caramel gaze of my bestest friend in the whole world. “I’ve missed you, Mike.”
He took a very long breath, wrapping his big hands around my hips again. “I missed you too, Ar.”
“And, Mike?” I grinned mischievously.
“Yeah,” he said, his eyes small with the relaxation his body stupidly felt while under me.
“Never let your guard down,” I said.
He had time only to widen his eyes as I rose up on my knees, making enough room for his body to twist under mine, then grabbed his shoulder and flipped him over, pressing my blade to the ball of his throat, holding his head in place by the scruff of his hair.
“Hey, guys,” Falcon said as he came in. “Mike, you going easy on that girl again?”
Mike’s arms came up, twisting at the elbows to knock my wrists away; my blade tore across his throat with the force, while the roll of his hips sent me to my back, on the floor, my legs open around him. “Maybe just a little.”
I pushed my cuff to his chin, holding him off me. “You were not,” I said, struggling. “You’re just embarrassed to be pinned by a girl.”