Ruler [Blood Magic, Book 3]

Chapter 62: Home is Where the Nosferatu Are

I woke to the blaring of the alarm clock, my stomach turning in grinding, noisy cartwheels, demanding, demanding, demanding. I'd gotten so caught up in the everything that had happened at the hotel that food had been the furthest thing from my mind, but not anymore. Now my hunger was front and centre, howling - for room service and vampire blood.

A swat of my sweaty, shaking palm took care of the incessant beeping of the cheap hotel alarm clock. I rested against the mattress as another wave of cramps eclipsed me, sending fistfuls of daggers into my gut, then I rolled myself back up against Keel. Wrapping my hand around his cool shoulder, I shook him. Nothing. I shook him harder. I'd never tried to wake him during daylight hours. Was it even possible? "Keel," I said, shaking him a third time, much more desperately now. Keel! Louder, and in his head.

He murmured something unintelligible and his eyelids fluttered.

Another massive shake.

"Are we in danger?" he said finally. His words thick and groggy, pushed forth from deep within the fog of sleep.

"No. But I need blood."

"You don't need to ask," he slurred, unconsciousness already pulling him away again.

"Yes, I do," I said, but he was gone.

I nestled into his neck, taking a moment to enjoy the earthy scent of him and the delicious aroma of his blood just beneath it. Mine, the beast inside me growled, the hunger bringing it much closer to the surface than I usually allowed it to come. He is yours, I whispered back. Forever. And then I gave it what it wanted: his marvelous, intoxicating blood. Keel's power raced into me, tangling up with my own. Even after everything, this remained one of the coolest aspects of our connection.

As soon as the need to eat began to dampen, I withdrew. Keel would not be able to feed until we returned to the compound - unless he drank from me, and blood-sharing in such a short span of time was nearly useless for sustenance. The blood that fed me could not immediately feed him again, not without greatly diminished results. I bit my own finger and smeared my blood into his, using magic to heal him. When the wound was gone, I leaned in once more and licked away the bloody evidence, wanting none of him to go to waste.

My supe needs taken care of, I dressed and returned to the main part of the penthouse, making sure the double door to the master bedroom was closed tightly behind me. Keel may not burst into flame in daylight, but the Nosferatu's deep sleep made them other kinds of vulnerable too.

The room service menu eluded me for a good ten minutes and no amount of magic was going to help me with that, so I was stuck searching for it the human way. I eventually found it in the bottom-most dresser drawer beneath the TV under a dog-eared Bible. Did hotels still stock those things, or had someone left it here hoping to sway the hungry with a higher power? I came up undecided, and ordered up a bunch of my favourite breakfast dishes, figuring we could pick up the tab easily enough if the sorcerers didn't. Keel never left the compound unprepared.

"Hungry?" Kristiana asked, as I welcomed her into the room soon after. My room service buffet was still spread out half-eaten on the coffee table. Before digging in, I'd moved the bond magic grimoire to the safety of one of the chairs, resisting the urge to flip through it with my greasy fingers. It was not a thing to be disrespected, even if my curiosity came close to winning the battle. "In all the excitement I missed a few meals yesterday. Do you want me to clean this up?"

I hoped she wouldn't ask me to put away the food, I hadn't yet had my fill.

"No, no," she waved off my suggestion. "We'll go over the magical theories before we practice any casting. Never mind that if you can't hold up a protection spell while eating, there's no use in teaching them in the first place."