“Then aren’t we still prisoners?” one of the men asked.
“It is for our protection,” Drake said. “And yours. If you wish to leave, you may do so at any time, but we must know first.”
“Will you still feed off us?” Northa asked.
“Yes, in exchange for feeding and housing you, but you will no longer be compelled to go with anyone you dislike. Nor will you be punished for refusing. Think about what I have said. You do not need to make any decisions tonight. Until decisions have been made, you will continue to stay in your rooms. That is all.”
“Do you think any of them will stay?” Elena asked when they returned to Drake’s apartment.
“Who can say? What would you do?”
Sitting on the sofa, she kicked off her shoes. “I don’t know. If I’d never lived anywhere else, never had the freedom to do as I pleased”—she shook her head—“I think I’d be afraid to leave, even though I think I’d want to.”
“You were brave enough to run away from your uncle.”
“That was different. I wasn’t a prisoner in his house. And I wasn’t going outside for the first time.”
Drake nodded as he took the seat beside her.
“What do you think they’ll do?” Elena asked. “And if they all leave . . . ?” She wasn’t quite sure how to phrase the next question, but Drake knew what she meant.
“I think the single men and some of the women will go. I know several of the females have strong feelings for some of my brothers. I think they will stay. Perhaps the couples, as well. As for what we would do if they all left . . .” He shrugged. “Every Coven has a Fortress like this one, but not all of them provide nourishment for those who live within its walls.”
“Oh.” She shuddered to think of the unsuspecting people who were helpless prey to the hunger of the vampires. “Have you spoken to your mother lately?”
“No. She has left the Fortress.”
“Where did she go?”
“I have no idea. I only heard of her departure late last night.”
Feeling suddenly queasy, Elena bit down on her lower lip. Drake was supposed to be his mother’s favorite son. But what if that were no longer true? Drake had destroyed Vardin. He had annulled his marriage to Katiya, resumed his marriage to a woman his mother did not approve of. And now he was bringing change to the Fortress.
Elena shivered. She recalled all too clearly the outrage in Liliana’s eyes the night before when Drake had assumed command of the Fortress—the fury in her voice, the way she had vanished from the Council chamber in a fit of anger.
People made jokes about their in-laws all the time, Elena thought, but there was nothing funny about an angry mother-in-law, not when she was also a powerful vampire.
As it turned out, Drake was right. The four breeding pairs, who had five children between them ranging in age from three months to fourteen years, decided to stay, as did most of the single women. All but one of the men opted to leave.
Those who had chosen to leave were schooled in how to survive in the outside world. Drake was elusive when Elena asked who was teaching them, but when she pressed harder, he told her that the vampires waited until the sheep were sleeping, then spoke to their minds, giving them the information they needed to live in the outside world.
“It is quicker and more effective than trying to teach them while they are awake,” he explained. “But most of the sheep are bright and learn quickly, since my sire selected only the best and the brightest for breeding. They made better companions.”
Breeding, Elena thought. With Drake as her husband, there was no chance of having children of her own. The thought made her stomach churn. Hurrying into the bathroom, she leaned over the commode.
Drake followed her into the bathroom. “Are you ill?”
“I must be catching the flu.” She rinsed her mouth, washed and dried her face. “I’ll be all right.”
Surprisingly, it only took a little over three weeks to prepare the sheep who had decided to leave the Fortress. Stefan and Liam were in charge of transporting them to various small towns in the area. Once they arrived at their destinations, the vampires erased all memories of their life at the Fortress and all memory of the vampires from their minds.
Elena was pleased with the changes Drake had made in the Fortress. It was far less lonely for her now that the sheep—she had to stop calling them that!—could move freely about the first three floors of the castle.
For the first time since she had been there, people walked the corridors during the day. The dining hall was no longer silent. The laughter of children echoed off the walls. Elena spent the daylight hours with Northa, Elnora, Marta, and some of the other women. Elnora was very much in love with Dallin, and since Drake had abolished the law forbidding vampires and humans to marry, she had high hopes that Dallin would propose. Marta held the same hopes for Cullin. Northa had elected to stay because she enjoyed the sensual pleasure of the vampire’s bite, and because she was afraid to leave the only home she had ever known.
“There’s no reason to leave now,” Northa said one afternoon. “Since we’re free to come and go as we please, and to go outside. . . .” She spread her arms wide. “Living here now is like being a princess in a castle.”
“I just wish my prince would ask me to marry him,” Elnora said with a sigh.
“Maybe you should ask him,” Northa said with a wink and a smile.
“Maybe I will!”
“Elena, you’re married to a vampire,” Marta said. “Is it wonderful?”
“Drake is wonderful,” she replied, smiling, and then she thought of Vardin. “But I don’t know if all vampires make wonderful husbands.”
Returning to their apartment, Elena curled up on the sofa and picked up a magazine. She thumbed through a few pages, but she kept thinking about what Marta had said. Would she have felt the same about Drake in the beginning if she had known what he was? Would she have had the courage to take the time to get to know him? Or would her fear of what he was have kept her from trusting him?
She wanted to think she would have loved him the same no matter what, and yet there were times, when she let herself think about the future, that she wished he was human, that they could share a meal, bask in the sun, return to Wolfram. Have a child.
“You are looking very pensive this evening,” Drake said.
“What?” She looked up, surprised to find him in the room. Usually, she sensed his presence almost before he appeared. “I was just thinking about . . . things.”