I inhaled a sharp breath and glared at him, mouth agape, blushing profusely as Alex sniggered. ‘How do you know that?’
‘Educated guess. And Inky was a gift, as you ask.’
‘From?’
Out of the blue, his eyes locked onto something over my shoulder, and distractedly, he muttered, ‘From a particularly idiotic leader of a dimension I can’t tell you about.’
Just as he said that, Alex cleared his throat with a meaningful look at Kaspar. ‘I’ll go round the others up. We should probably get going soon.’ They both froze: Kaspar’s brow lowering as Alex presumably said something to him in his mind. The former stuffed his hands inside the pockets of his dark jacket, slowly beginning to follow the other man who was striding back around the lake.
I fell in step beside him. ‘Are you going to explain that?’
He did not answer. I sensed he was gathering his thoughts, so didn’t pester. Across the clearing the others had come together as a group once more and were filing back into the forest. I noticed Lyla’s hand was firmly clasped in Fabian’s.
Out of the blue, he sighed; a long, low sigh. ‘Fate’s a cruel thing, Girly. It tears people apart and breaks hearts; it hurts the innocent. Time does the same: it rips people up, limb from limb, until they are too weak to remain upright; to stand and to live. You’ll appreciate that better than I do.’
I glanced at him. ‘I will?’
He chuckled, but his laugh was lifeless; flat. Inside my pockets, my fingers clutched at the lining of the coat. The serious tone he used was more than unnerving – it filled me with dread.
‘Before you had to have the blood transfusion, you were entirely mortal. If you were lucky, you would have made it to ninety. Now you are a dhampir, you will live longer than your human counterparts. Before all this, death was still very real to you. But now you know you have to become a vampire and millennia stretch out in front of you.’
I shrugged my shoulders, unsure of where he was going. ‘To be honest, I never thought about death. Even when Greg died and Lily got ill, I still thought I would live forever. It’s a teenage thing, I guess.’ I paused, thinking. ‘The first time I really thought about death was when I got here, when I had to make the choice between a lifetime as a prisoner and becoming a vampire. It spelt death either way.’
He stopped abruptly. ‘You think becoming a vampire might as well be death?’
I spun around, walking backwards so I could face him. I could see the hurt in his eyes, clear as day – an overcast one, for they were a smoky grey.
‘I did. Not any more.’
His eyes didn’t fade but he managed a feeble smile in return. ‘That’s a sudden change of mind. Not something to do with my outburst earlier, is it?’
I shrugged. ‘You were right. I’ve got to accept the inevitable. I never had any choice, because remaining a part of humanity is what will kill me, not stopping my heart to become a vampire.’ Behind him, I could see a tentacle slip back into the water noiselessly, dragging a chunk of muddy grass verge with it. Above us in the trees I could see a squirrel cautiously approaching the end of a branch, about to leap to the next. ‘And you cleared something up for me earlier.’
‘Which was?’
I took a deep breath, knowing that in years to come I would look back on my next words with either bitter regret or a warm, contented smile. Yet all the hype and the inner debate that had been present in me since the first day of August didn’t seem to have any effect on that which was around me. The birds still twittered their early morning song, the trees still swayed and the squirrel still did not leap. The ticking of Kaspar’s watch went on, uninterrupted.
‘I know now that I don’t have to kill to feed, which was my major objection to turning.’
It took a few seconds for my words to sink in. When it did, the expression on his face – a mixture between surprise, confusion and disbelief – was one I burnt as a brand to my memory, determined to remember it, whether I was going to be bitter or glad in the future.
‘Wait … are you saying … you want to become a vampire?’ He collapsed up against a nearby tree, looking like he might pass out from shock if he could.
‘Yes.’
‘Shit,’ he breathed.
I nodded. I might never have had a real choice, but the truth is I’m doing it for him. I couldn’t help but hold out a glimmer of hope that if I turned, the King might just allow us to touch. I didn’t know if we’d ever make it in a relationship; I didn’t know if it was even allowed, but I had to believe that everything would work out fairytale style if – when – I turned. I had to. It made it feel as though I was in control of my humanity.
‘Shit,’ he repeated, pushing his hair back from his forehead. ‘I-I never thought I would hear you say that. Violet Lee, a vampire. You really are sure? You made your mind up so quickly.’
Adamant, I began walking once more. ‘Yes. I’ve been thinking about it a lot the last few days,’ I lied. I hadn’t really considered it until a few minutes ago when Kaspar had desperately, just inches from me on my bed, uttered that unfinished sentence. It really was a decision based on the hope that he was going to finish it with ‘you’. The ability to feed without killing was a massively welcomed bonus.
I continued. ‘But I was wondering, are there rules? About turning someone?’ Side-by-side, we entered the forest, a fair way behind the others now. I could see their darkly-clothed figures, draped in coats, weaving between the trees, far out of earshot.
‘Not strictly, no. Not for vampires, anyway. But a vampire who turns a human is expected to give their charge – the turned vampire,’ he explained, seeing my expression, ‘a rite of passage and teach them the laws of the Kingdom, that sort of thing.’
I felt like I had swallowed a cherry stone whole. His tone was so distant; there was no joking or pleasure, or even surprise in it, like I had expected, and I already felt that bitter regret creeping up on me.
‘A rite of passage?’ I managed.
‘God, you have so much to learn,’ he groaned. ‘There is no such thing as a poor vampire, Girly. The Kingdom is made up of wealthy families and their charges. A respectable family will treat their charge well, allow them wealth and introduce them into society. Some charges aren’t as lucky and end up as rogues or servants. You see? But I still don’t think you’re sure about this. And why are you blushing?’