Part 16 (1/2)
He ran a finger around the cup, outlining her hands, enjoying the feel of her. He could still detect a tremor though, an inward flinching. He had all but conditioned her to expect a verbal blow every time she let her defenses down to him. ”I'm so sorry for how I've treated you.”
”You're evading again. Abbot. Tell me.”
He hovered over the mug. ”Blackmail? Ransom for my dinner? Yes, he's. a vampire, though he wouldn't put it that way. It's complicated.”
”Not now then. Here. Take it.”
Instead, he kissed her delicately on the eyelids, the nose, then the lips. He worked down to the mug, his lips on her fingers bespeaking his love. ”Abbot, then. After dinner. The whole story.” He drank from between her hands.
”I don't know what it is when you do that,” she whispered, ”but I feel it, all over my body.”
”Me, too.” He drank steadily, pausing only to refill the mug and grab a moistened towelette from the dispenser near the head of the bed. He wiped his lips each time he drank, and then resumed experimenting with his lips on her skin. As he finished the blood, the scintillating arousal dancing between them intensified. ”What do you feel?”
”Wonderful. Do that some more.”
He set the mug on the floor and laid her back on the bed. Like this?” He trailed kisses around her neck.
”Vampire.”
And he knew what the difference was. She believed him at completely-and trusted him not to hurt her again. There was a wholeness in her gift to him that he could never have evoked with Influence. Even humans he took by consent never knew enough to truly consent, as she had.
He began undressing her. Slowly, hardly disturbing the rhythm, he discarded their clothing and moved them up to lie full length on the bed. Using all his senses, he strove to gift her with as much of value as she had given him.
He made it last a very long time. Together, they finally surrendered to the inevitable.
t.i.tus found tears leaking down his temples as he lay on his back beside her. That pure, clean surge of ectoplasm had touched something too deep for words.
Given this, how could anybody want anything else? Then he understood. Abbot had never had this. He couldn't. Most luren, even Residents, couldn't. It demanded total commitment, both from the luren and from the human, to create this. But it was more precious than anything, for it had the power to dispel the feral rage. t.i.tus knew that it was not only gone, but that it would never return.
”What are you thinking?” asked Inea.
”I'm glad we came to your room. I don't think it would have been as powerful in my room. And I needed all of it.”
”Me too.” She wiped away some tears of her own.
”Promise me something.”
”Hmm?”
”Never invite Abbot in here.”
She propped herself up. ”All right. I won't invite him in. Now, please explain why real vampires, not the magical kind, care about an invitation? That's supposed to be superst.i.tion, like crosses and mirrors; evil can't endure good, the sight of itself, or enter uninvited. You like crosses, mirrors reflect you, and yet. this!”
”I can't explain it, certainly not in terms of any physics we know. I don't want to look at it too closely, for fear I'll discover that physics as we know it is garbage.”
”Can't be that bad. Physics works.”
”True. But so does whatever it is we have. One theory is that it has something to do with gravity and magnetic fields. Location is important. You know-the bit about how a vampire has to sleep in his own coffin? We get around it by generating the magnetic field we need to rest in. Simple electronics, but it gives us freedom.”
”You mean you don't cart around your native earth?”
”I'm not a potted plant!”
”But what's that got to do with needing an invitation?”
”Some people create a sort of bubble or sphere around their home, almost a kind of personal magnetic field. This is your place. I think Abbot could break in, if he wanted to, but more likely he'd just-how did you say it?-put a whammy on you to make you want to invite him in.”
”He could do that?”
”He can do everything I can do-only better-and more besides. You have to understand about Abbot. He's not evil. He's rigorously ethical, courageous-even heroic-charitable, and dedicated to his cause. He'd give his life and more for the lives and honor of all of Earth's vampires.”
”So you don't think he could have been the ninja? But if he's so wonderful, why do you fear him?”
He looked up at her. What if she never offers me that gift again? He wanted to wipe all this from her memory.
”t.i.tus, what's the matter?”
There was nothing for it but to spit it out. ”Abbot doesn't share my. diet. or my goals. He's opposed to everything I stand for-and he's my father.”
She sat up. ”What!”
He sat up and pulled the cover around them. Trying to be clinical, he launched into the story of how it had been Abbot had resurrected him from the grave because his own genetic father had disappeared. ”By giving me blood after that long dormancy, he became my father-the one whose power I can't successfully oppose. Ever. For any reason.” Up to now, t.i.tus knew, Abbot had been toying with him. Even his one success in the men's room at G.o.ddard Station had been more accident than success. When he'd tried to block Abbot from Influencing Inea in the lab, he'd come as close to pitting his power against Abbot's as a son ever could. Abbot had been so astonished, he'd desisted. But t.i.tus knew what would have happened had Abbot chosen to use his power.
”So, knowing he's safe, Abbot uses his power against you? Why?”
”Abbot's a typical Tourist, so I left him to join the Residents as soon as I discovered them.” He explained that much of luren politics.
”So the Residents s.h.i.+p you powdered blood, and the Tourists feed on humans like cattle?” ”
He hadn't used that image to her. ”That's exactly how they think of it. So you see, Abbot's a very real danger to you because I can't protect you from him.”
”Why would he want to hurt me?”
”He wouldn't. He's no s.a.d.i.s.t. He wouldn't perceive your pain at all. He would take you simply to get at me.”
”Why would he want to do that?”
”I told you he's dedicated to goals and ideals far beyond himself. To protect all vampires, he'd kill me-he'd mourn, he'd suffer-but he'd do it. And in telling you all this, without ”gagging' you, I've broken a law Abbot lives by. I've jeopardized us all. The penalty is death. We're alive because so far, he doesn't know how much you know.”
”Oh G.o.d. I didn't understand what you meant that first night-death for you, and being gagged for me. Abbot would kill you and take me, wouldn't he?”
”Yes.”
She was silent a long time. Then, in a very small voice, she said, ”t.i.tus, I want you to put that gag-whammy on me. I don't care, because I won't ever want to tell anyone.”
He kissed her.
She grabbed him by the ears and pushed him back. ”You do it, you hear me-because-because-”
”Not yet. Listen. There's more.”