"I'm not good company right now. I don't feel so good," I muttered.
"I know this," he folded next to me and placed large blue hands on my body, taking the pain away easily and trilling to me while he did so. "Lissa Beth, I've missed you so," he soothed, in between trilling. His words made me go still, and then I shivered. "I only wanted to hold you again," he whispered. "You don't have to take me back if you don't want to."
Why hadn't I seen it before? Connegar had been René once. Now I had my first love back, as a Larentii. Don deserved that if anyone did.
"Did someone want to give me the best gift ever?" I asked, nearly sobbing.
"Shhh, don't cry, my love," my tears were wiped away by large blue thumbs. "See, I am better at this, now," he was trying to smile at me.
"I missed you so much," I almost threw myself into his arms. He cradled me against him and trilled again. Light formed around him and I knew he was healing my body while he held me. His eyes were closed in bliss while he did this. I felt so good and so free I could have flown afterward.
Chapter 8
There was quite a stir in the meeting when Reemagar and I showed up together the following morning. He'd stayed the night with me in the hotel room. I'd Pulled clothing in to dress, after he enlarged the spa tub and let me lean against him while the water bubbled around us. Connegar had folded in and smiled at both of us. He'd known, the little devil. Well, not so little, since he was nine and a half feet tall. He'd sat on the edge of the tub and trilled for Reemagar and me. Yeah, I loved my Larentii.
"Lissa, where have you been?" Gabron was upset, I could tell. Well, so was I. And Gardevik, the slime, who knew where he was?
"Before we get started today," I announced, "I want to make a proclamation. The palace will be moved when the casinos and brothels open. I will move it myself, if I have no volunteers to help."
That caused a stillness throughout the room.
"Lissa, what are you saying?" Gabron didn’t want to dress me down in front of the Council.
"I'm saying I don't want to be anywhere near this," I said. "I have no desire to see the comesuli treated like slaves or children. I have no desire to see pictures of my palace on T-shirts and coffee mugs. Go ahead and turn my planet into a circus if you want, I just don't want to see it on my front doorstep when I wake up in the morning."
"Lissa, that is not our intention." Adam and Merrill showed up in a flash of light. Flavio must have sent them mindspeech.
"That's easy for you to say, you don't live here," I pointed out. "Imagine a casino in your front yard, Merrill. Tell me how the comesuli will be treated. The tourists will be coming to see vampires. The comesuli are my family. I will not have them mistreated. They are already frightened by the brothels being built, thinking the pleasure workers will entice their vampires away. How will you calm their fears, Gabron?" I turned to my Refizani vampire mate. "Who will be training the pleasure workers, Gabron?" He knew I knew, when his eyes met mine.
"We can control the visitors into the capital city," Adam offered. "We will make it so they must apply for a permit to visit. The casino city will be ten miles west of Lissia and we can offer day passes to those who wish to visit. You may reject any of those, if you wish."
"Adam, I have no desire to sit at my desk and go over hundreds of requests daily," I said. "Select one day a week when tours may be arranged. I will most likely be out of town on that day."
"What has precipitated this?" Gabron asked. He wanted to tell me I was acting foolishly—I could see it in his face.
"Am I Queen of Le-Ath Veronis or not?" I asked. "Am I Queen of all its inhabitants and not just the vampires? When you build this, tell me that I will not become a laughing stock—Queen of the casinos and brothels. A figurehead only, while all of you make the decisions. I will not be put on display while tourists snap photographs of me to transmit to their colleagues at home."
Jeral stood near the back of the room. "I do not believe it was our intention to upset the Queen," he said. "The Belipharan vampires are grateful for the comesuli who live among us, now. They have become like family in such a short amount of time. I cannot imagine that we would treat them as less, even if we do seek the pleasure houses."
"I thought you were moving into the palace," I said.
"Davan and I are making arrangements with help from our brother, my Queen. We are working with my associates to ensure a smooth transition." He sat down again.
"My Queen," another vampire stood, near the middle of the room. "You will never be a figurehead to me. When two others and I came to you three months ago, we were not turned away at the door as we expected to be. We were ushered directly into your study and we discussed vacation time for the workers. You told me then that you had already considered it and showed us several plans. You also informed us that the Reth Alliance planets might be possible destinations if we desired to travel off world. Then you took my two colleagues and me to visit the space station, which was being built. I was shocked that the Queen would take time to do this for us."
"Don't you think you deserve it?" I asked.
"Perhaps. But deserving and receiving are generally two different things," he bowed. "The four weeks of vacation that you insisted on went over very well with the workers at the blood substitute manufacturing plant."
"Well, since we don't have to pay for Social Security or health insurance," I said. He laughed and sat down.
"Lissa, we've had offers to buy either the formula for the blood substitute or to buy the bottled product itself," Merrill said, attempting to calm me down by changing the subject. He was probably wise to do so, my fangs were pricking my lower lip and my eyes were probably a shade away from red.
"Well, you guys came up with that, you can do whatever you want with it."
"Lissa, you're not being selfish enough over this," he informed me. "The plant is sitting on property owned by the crown. You own a piece of this. What do you want to do?"
"How big is the market?" I asked. "Do we have the facilities to manufacture enough to meet the demand? If so, then let's do it from here. If not, then sell the formula. That's simple enough."
"I think we can manufacture here," Adam said. "If we triple the size of the plant, which can be done soon. I'll have a feasibility study on your desk by next week."