Jessica's Guide to Dating on the Dark Side (10 page)

Honor. Discipline. Force. What did these Elders do to him?

I was used to men like my dad and the other fathers I knew. Nice guys. Guys who wore Dockers and played kickball with their kids and put on funny ties at Christmas. Lucius was as different from those men as his weapons collection was from Mom's dolls. He was undeniably charming when he wanted to be, his manners were smooth, but there was a roughness just below the surface.

"Those are your parents," Lucius continued, his voice very quiet. I returned my attention to the genealogy as he ran his fingers over the names Mihaela and Ladislau, just above my own.

My birth mother. And biological father. Their death dates were scrawled there, too.

I stifled a groan of frustration and anger.
Why do we have to keep returning to my birth parents?
This was supposed to be a happy year for me. A carefree time. But Lucius had arrived, and with him my past. He didn't just drag me down with a nonsensical story about vampires and weddings, but he kept trying to lasso me with my
real
past, too. To loop a noose around my neck and drag me through a graveyard. Lucius's presence was a constant reminder of who I might have been in Romania. A reminder of not just vampires but ghosts. The ghosts of Mihaela and Ladislau Dragomir.

They were strangers, really. . . I wouldn't grieve them . . .
And yet I felt sad.

His own sorrow made Lucius's voice even softer. He traced the unfamiliar words
Valeriu
and
Reveka.
"And these were my parents."

I wanted to say something. The right thing. But I didn't know what that might be, for either of us. "Lucius . . ."

"See this date," he continued, not looking at me. "Under our names? That marks our betrothal ceremony. Our parents wrote that date. At least, one of them did." A whisper of a wistful smile played upon his lips. "That was a great day for the Vladescus and Dragomirs. Our two warring clans at peace. Prepared to join together. So much power in one place. How many times have I heard that story?"

"But that's what it is ... a story."

"It's an edict." Lucius slammed the book shut with a thud. "We are meant to be together. Regardless of how we feel about each other. Irrespective of how much you
despise
me."

"I don't despise you .. ."

"No?" His eyebrows arched, and his mouth twisted into a wry smile. "You could have fooled me."

I turned the tables. "You talk a lot about obligation and duty and chivalry, but I don't get the sense you really like me that much, either. You can't tell me
you
want to marry
me.
You just called me a child!"

Lucius took a long time choosing his words. "You are a puzzle to me, Jessica," he finally said. "A mystery. But at least I am open to the possibility of exploring that which I don't understand."

The dim light glimmered in his black eyes, and we were so close that I could see the faint shadow of stubble on his cheeks. Most guys I knew still seemed more like boys than men. Did Jake even shave? But Lucius ... he had crossed that line. And I was sitting on a bed with him. Alone. In a darkened room. Talking about "exploring" my so-called "mysteries." I edged away.

"What would happen, anyway, if we didn't get married?" I asked, trying to change the subject. Distancing us again. "How bad could it be?"

Lucius moved away, too, reclining back on the bed, propped on his elbows. "Most likely a full-scale war, your family against mine, some five million vampires struggling to fill the power vacuum, building coalitions, leaders rising and falling, destruction and bloodshed on a massive scale. And when vampires war ... well, as the old adage says, 'an army travels on its stomach.'"

I wasn't familiar with the saying, so—against my better judgment—I asked, "And that means . . . ?"

"Armies need to eat," Lucius clarified. "So the streets will run with human blood, too. There will be chaos. Countless loss of lives." Lucius paused, shrugging. "Or maybe nothing would happen. Vampires are a very capricious people. It's one of our best—and worst—traits. But really, it's probably not wise to risk it."

"Why do Vladescus and Dragomirs supposedly hate each other so much?"

Lucius shrugged. "Why do all powerful nations and cultures and religions clash? For control of territory. For the simple lust for dominance. It has always been so between our two clans—until the pact secured a tentative promise of peace through unification, as equals. If we fail to complete the bargain—you and I—the blood is on our hands."

Images of blood-drenched streets—my fault—kept flashing in my brain like a movie scene being replayed over and over, so I stood, shaking my head. "That's the stupidest story I've ever heard."

"Really?" Lucius's eyes were now inscrutable, which was somehow scarier than his anger. He rose, too. "How shall I make you believe this 'story'?"

"You can't." I backed up a little. "Because vampires don't exist."

"I exist. You exist."

"I'm not a vampire," I insisted. "That genealogy means nothing."

Anger flashed in Lucius's eyes. "The genealogy means
everything.
It is the only possession I prize."

I retreated a few more paces. He seemed to loom taller than ever. "I have to go now," I told him.

But with each step, Lucius advanced toward me, slowly, and I found myself halting, spellbound by those black eyes, mesmerized. The shiver down my spine came stronger, rooting me to the floor like an electric shock.

"I don't believe in vampires," I whispered, but with less conviction.

"You will believe."

"No. It's not rational."

Lucius was inches from me now, and he leaned down, the better to see eye-to-eye. And then he bared his teeth. Only they weren't just teeth anymore. They were fangs. Two fangs, to be precise. Two sharp, seductive, gleaming fangs. They were the most awful, perfect, unbelievable things I had ever seen.

I wanted to scream. Scream as loud as humanly possible. Or maybe feel Lucius clasp my shoulders, pull me tightly to himself, feel the authority in his hands, the touch of his lips, those teeth on my throat. . .
Oh, god.
What was wrong with me? What was wrong with
him?
He was a freaking vampire. He really was.
No.
It was a magic trick. An illusion.

I closed my eyes, rubbing them, cursing myself for falling for the fakery and yet half expecting the sensation of razorlike incisors slicing into my jugular. "Please . . . don't!"

There was a moment of silence that stretched on forever. A moment when I honestly believed that he might hurt me. And then, suddenly, Lucius really did grab my arms and pull me close, enfolding me against his chest, just as he'd done in my dream. Firmly, but gently.

"Antanasia," he murmured, and his voice was soft again. He smoothed my curls with his hand, and I allowed him to soothe me, too relieved to object. "I'm sorry . . . that was cruel to scare you," he said. "I should not have done that, that way. Please, forgive me."

Tentatively, I wrapped my arms around Lucius's narrow waist, not even sure why I did it, and he squeezed me even closer, resting his chin on the top of my head. His hand covered the entire small of my back, which he stroked softly. We stood that way for about a full minute. I could feel his heart beat against my cheek. Very softly. Very slowly. Almost imperceptibly. Mine was pounding, and I knew he could feel that, too.

Finally I pulled back, and he let me go.

"Don't ever do that stupid trick again," I said, surprised to find that my voice was shaky. "Never. It's not funny."

The crazy Croatian music spun on the turntable, eerie and penetrating. Lucius took my arm, and I hated that a part of me welcomed his touch again. Hated that it had been hard to pull away.
He's a lunatic, Jess.

"Please, Jessica. Sit." Lucius gestured to the bed. "You look a little pale."

Sit. . . and then what will happen?

"I ... I have to go," I said.

Lucius didn't try to stop me, and I left him standing there, in the middle of that dark room. I tripped down the steps, and when I reached our yard, I ran, not stopping until I'd locked the door in my own room, breathless, flushed, and incredibly, incredibly confused. Because what I'd felt hadn't just been fear. It had been something like the sensations I'd had in my dream
about Lucius.
Disgust turned to fear turned to lust. . .
alchemy. Insanity. It was all mixed up in my brain suddenly. And it was so, so wrong.

Chapter
13

"TODAY WE'RE GOING to discuss the concept of transcendental numbers," our math team coach, Mr. Jaegerman, announced, rubbing his hands together with arithmetic glee.

All five of us mathletes leaned over our notebooks, pens poised.

"A transcendental number is any number that is non-algebraic—not the root of any integer polynomial," Mr. Jaegerman began.

Mike Danneker's hand shot up. "Like pi."

"Yes," Mr. Jaegerman cried, jabbing chalk at the board, writing the symbol for pi. "Exactly." He was already sweating a little. Mr. Jaegerman was bald, and slightly overweight, and wore polyester, but he had an admirable enthusiasm for numbers.

I wrote the symbol Π in my notebook, wishing we weren't wasting time on theoretical concepts. I preferred to practice with practical problems, as opposed to dealing with abstract ideas.

"Pi is an excellent example of a transcendental number," our teacher continued. "The ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter. We're all familiar with pi. But we usually just stop at 3.14 when we use it. As we all know, though, pi is actually much longer. And although we humans have figured out pi to roughly the trillionth digit, there is no end in sight. It is infinite, 'unsolvable.' And—this is the mind-blowing part—the numbers form no pattern."

He scribbled on the board.
3.1415926535897932. . .
"It goes on and on, randomly. Forever."

We all paused, drinking this in. Of course, as students interested in math, we'd all thought about pi before. But the idea of those numbers streaming across galaxies, across time ... it was very confusing. Unnerving, almost. Impossible to grasp.

"And of course"—Mr. Jaegerman broke our reverie—"a transcendental number like pi is, by definition,
irrational."

He paused to let us catch up, and I carefully printed the word in my notebook.
Irrational.

The word seemed to stare back at me off the page. In the back of my mind, I heard my mother saying,
"Jessica, there are things in the world that you can't explain
..."

But you
can
explain them,
my brain objected.
Even pi is explainable. Sort of Numbers are solid. Real.

Except numbers that snaked their way to eternity.
Eternity.
Now there was another concept I couldn't grasp.

Souls linked for eternity.
Lucius had said that one time when he'd brought up the betrothal ceremony. Lucius, the least rational person I knew.
Vampires and pacts, they are irrationals. Like pi?