Serpent's Kiss (29 page)

Rune came up on his elbow to look down at her. His gaze was sharp, his lean features focused. The fine lines at the corners of his mouth deepened. “Dragos left me a message to call him as soon as I could,” he said. “Of course I haven’t had time yet. I wonder if he was calling about the same thing. I need to call him back to find out what’s going on.”

“We have a hell of a lot to untangle,” Carling said. “Just set aside the whole dying problem for a moment. Nobody’s going to be happy when they find out what’s just happened between us. Not the Nightkind demesne, not the Wyr, and certainly not the Elder tribunal.”

They were both silent for a moment as they absorbed the enormity of the challenges in front of them.

Then Rune kissed her cheek. He blew a little in her ear, and she cringed away from how it tickled. “It’s always something.”

SEVENTEEN

T
he hotel phone rang, and Rune rolled over to answer it. Full night had fallen, and he switched on the bedside lamp as he did, flooding the room in soft light. Carling could clearly hear the feminine voice on the other end. “Rune, I just arrived at the hotel and I’ve checked into the room you booked for me.”

“Excellent, Seremela,” he said. “Please come up to the suite as soon as you are able.” He raised his eyebrows at Carling, who nodded in agreement.

“I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

As he twisted at the waist to hang up the phone, Carling ran her fingers along the line of his bare torso, from shoulder to hip. He turned back to her, his features creased in a smile. “Claiming each other is one thing,” she said. “Figuring out how to do ‘together’ is an entirely different thing.”

“We’ve come out of the gate strong,” Rune said. He came over her, bracing himself on one elbow by her head as he leaned down to kiss her. “We’ve learned to trust each other, like each other and enjoy each other’s company. We just have to keep relying on each other as we fight to find a cure for you. Learning about the rest, making life decisions about what comes next, all that can wait.”

Carling stared up at him, aching as she thought of everything he was giving up for her. She said slowly, “If we really find a cure that works, then I may become human again. If that happens, I’ll die so soon, in just another fifty years or so.” After the enormous amount of time she had lived through, fifty years seemed like an eye blink.

“Those fifty years would be worth everything to me,” he whispered back. His smiling eyes never wavered. They were clear and steady, right down to the bottom of his soul.

He really meant it, she saw. He really was mating with her, committing to her. He didn’t hold back, or qualify or try to dissemble. He would live as she lived, and die as she died. Panic struck her all over again, deeper and harder than before, not for her sake but for his.

She had qualified things and dissembled. Fight to live, he had said to her, and even as she did so, she still prepared to die, still settled her affairs and said her good-byes, still braced herself for the end.

Holy gods, not anymore. She had to fight to live with everything she had inside, because this was no longer just about her. It was about them both. She gripped his wrist hard. “We don’t have any time to lose.”

“Then we best get cracking,” he said.

He rolled off the bed and to his feet in one smooth, lithe motion. She sat more slowly, watching as he picked up the clothes from the floor. His hair was tousled more than ever, his nude muscled body bearing bite and scratch marks that were fading even as she watched. The embers of passion flared in her body as she stared at his neck. As he leaned over to lay her jeans, shirt and lingerie on the bed beside her, she reached up to finger the bite mark.

She felt his breath leave him. He gave her a glittering look under lowered eyelids. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his penis stiffen. He said roughly, “Behave.”

“Do you really want me to?” she asked gently.

His expression turned scorching. “Seremela’s going to be here in just over five minutes.”

She tilted her face up to his as she took hold of his erection. She rubbed her thumb over the broad head of his cock. He bared his teeth. He looked savage and magnificent, barely held in check and completely inhuman. Gods, how she loved this man. She whispered, “We’ll just have to remember where we left off then.”

“Bloody hell, woman,” he gritted. He grabbed hold of her wrist but didn’t pull her hand away. A muscle in his bicep started jumping, he was holding himself so tightly.

She bent sideways to kiss the muscle in his arm. She felt like she was immersed in him, his aroused scent, his hot presence, and yet starving for him at the same time.
She was so starving.
She raked her teeth gently along the skin of the bunched muscle, and he made a muffled sound and went down hard on one knee on the floor beside the bed.

She put her arms around his neck and kissed him. He clutched her to him, kissing her back with every bit as much hunger as she had. “Mine,” she whispered against his lips.

“Mine,” he whispered back. He ran his lips compulsively down her neck to her breastbone, bending her back. His mind slid on a patch of black ice as he flashed on her incomparable, gorgeous body, those curves, the jut of her ripe nipples, those strong shapely legs as she had wound them around his hips—

A knock sounded at the suite door, and he yanked away from the siren’s call of Carling’s body with a growl as he snatched up his clothes. She fell back laughing on the bed, her eyes dancing with such wicked delight it nearly broke his head to walk away from her. “
Later
,” he snarled at her.

“Oh my gods, yes,” she breathed, stretching out her naked body. “Later, and again, and repeatedly, I hope.”

He gave her a white-hot glare and bolted from the bedroom. There was another knock at the door. He roared, “Just a fucking minute!”

From the hall outside the suite, a woman said in a startled voice, “I’m sorry, I do beg your pardon.”

Rune swore then called out, “No, Seremela, I’m sorry. Hold on, I’ll be with you in just a moment.”

Carling snatched a pillow, crammed her face into it and rolled around on the bed as she laughed and laughed.

When she heard Rune open the door, she grabbed her clothes and shoved off the bed, and walked into the bathroom for a quick wash before she dressed. She caught a glimpse of her short tousled hair and makeup-smeared face in the mirror and exploded with laughter again.

Here’s the spook house/roller coaster mash-up again. Euphoria and glee, sprinkled with outright terror. She turned on the water faucet and splashed her face off. The water felt crisp, cold and good.

Rune raised his voice. “Carling, I’m going to start explaining things to Seremela, if you don’t mind. If you would rather, we can wait until you get in here.”

She called back, “Not at all. Please go ahead. I’ll be right there.”

She listened to the two of them talk as she finished dressing. She thought about digging out a caftan from her suitcases but she wanted to put on the exotic jeans and flared silk crepe T-shirt instead, although she chose to remain barefoot. She ran her hands through her choppy short hair then went out to the living room.

She found them sitting in the living area. Rune had dressed in his black clothes and had finger-combed his own hair. He looked burnished and vibrant, and so sexy she pulsed with the dark urgent desire to mark him again. The medusa had taken an armchair, and Rune sat at one end of the couch. He was leaning forward, his elbows on his knees, moodily spinning an iPhone in circles on the coffee table as he talked. Both he and Seremela stood as she entered the room.

Carling strode forward to offer her hand. The medusa watched her approach with a wide, curious gaze. Seremela said with a smile, “It’s an honor to meet you, Councillor.”

“Thank you for coming on such short notice, Doctor.”

“Please, call me Seremela. I was happy Rune called, and it will be my pleasure to do anything I can to help.”

Carling watched the medusa’s expression closely. “You may find a lot of what we have to say disturbing. We need your confidentiality on this.”

“Of course,” said Seremela.

Carling glanced at Rune, her eyebrows raised. He nodded. She turned her attention back to the doctor.

As a medusa, Seremela Telemar was Demonkind, although she lived in Chicago, well outside the Demonkind demesne in Houston. She was a pretty woman in late middle age. Carling guessed her to be around three hundred and eighty years old. Her head snakes had grown to the length of her thighs. When she reached old age, they would touch the floor. Her skin was a creamy pale green with a faint snakeskin pattern, and her slitted eyes had a nictating membrane that was open for the moment. Several of her head snakes tasted the air as they peered curiously around her waist and over her shoulder at Carling.

However, most of the medusa’s head snakes were more interested in Rune. Carling watched a couple of the snakes slide up his arm. Was she imagining things, or was it actually possible for a head snake to look adoring?

Neither Rune nor Seremela were paying attention to what the medusa’s snakes were doing. They were busy in conversation, talking to each other as they focused on her.

Carling cocked her head and pursed her lips.

Snakes.

She strode forward and snatched up the two head snakes, one in each hand. Rune watched her in mild surprise. Seremela jumped and blushed, and began to apologize profusely, “I’m so sorry, I wasn’t paying attention. You know they have a mind of their own and, well, they like Rune.”

Carling ignored her. She held up the two snakes and looked at them. They looked back at her, their tongues flickering. They did not appear alarmed or disturbed at her handling of them. A couple of other head snakes lifted to twine around her wrists. Seremela gave an embarrassed laugh. “It looks like they like you too.”

“Of course it is,” Carling said to the snakes.

“Of course what is?” Rune asked.

“You said it was important to go back to the beginning, and it was,” Carling said. “The serpent goddess wasn’t just an archaic, superstitious Egyptian folktale. She was a real creature named Python who actually existed. So the next logical step is that the serpent’s kiss really is a serpent’s kiss. Vampyrism became a blood-borne pathogen, and Vampyres are created in a blood-to-blood exchange. But it had to have started as venom.”

After she said that, she and Rune had to tell the story from the beginning. Seremela listened intently to everything they told her. She looked shaken at the thought of history being changed, interrupting only to ask for clarification at certain points in the dialogue until she heard of Carling’s early sketches of Python. “You
sketched
Python?” the medusa breathed.

“No, I never met Python,” Carling corrected, smiling. “I sketched the illustrations of her that were on the cavern wall.”

“What I wouldn’t give to see those,” Seremela said, eyes shining. “Did you know we call ourselves Python’s children?”

Carling and Rune looked at each other. She had taken a seat beside him on the couch, and he rested his arm along the back, from time to time fingering the hair at the back of her head. Carling shook her head, and Rune said, “I had no idea either.”

The medusa shrugged. “I don’t know if there’s any historical accuracy in that. If the medusas really are Python’s children, that would have happened so long ago it would have predated your Egyptian cavern by thousands of years.”

“Do you know what happened to her?” Rune said. He was watching Seremela, his expression intent. “All I heard was that she died.”

“She traveled to Greece and was killed at Delphi,” Seremela said. “Some versions of the story say she was murdered. In Greek mythology the god Apollo killed her, but Greek mythology is a lot like Egyptian or any other mythology—the myths are mostly strange stories that hold a few kernels of truth. I’ve heard other stories that simply say she was killed when she fell down a fissure in the earth. She lived in Greece long enough to establish the Oracle at Delphi, though.”

“I thought the Oracle was a genetic inheritance, and the Oracle’s ability to prophesy was passed down from generation to generation within a human family,” Carling said. “At least that’s what previous Oracles have told me when we’ve talked.”

The Oracle from Delphi had long since relocated to the States to join the demesne of human witches in Louisville. In each generation of the Oracle’s family, there was always a single woman who inherited the title, along with the oracular abilities, whenever the previous Oracle died. She was separate from the main ruling structure of the witches’ demesne, which was governed by an elected Head, yet the Oracle was a dignitary in her own right. Carling had not met the newest Oracle. The transfer of Power had taken place just some months before when the previous Oracle and her husband had been killed in a car crash.

Carling had to struggle to hide how bitterly she was disappointed in hearing someone else confirm Python’s death. She thought she had control over her expression, but Rune’s hand dropped to her shoulder in a bracing grip.

“Well, the ability to prophesy is now passed down from generation to generation,” said Seremela. “Just as Vampyrism is now passed from human to human. Where the ability of the Oracle originated is another question entirely.”

“Have you consulted an Oracle before?” Rune asked Seremela curiously. He had talked with Oracles just as Carling had, when socializing at inter-demesne functions, but he had never before been interested in talking to one while she was channeling the Power of prophesy. Cryptic ramblings drove him crazy. As he had said to Carling earlier, talking to Python had been like tripping on a bad dose of LSD.

“I consulted an Oracle when I was much younger,” said Seremela. “I was barely fifty at the time, and curious. I found it to be a Powerful and disturbing experience. The prophesying is never a controlled thing, either for the petitioner or the Oracle.”

“Do you mind if I ask what she told you?” Rune asked.

“I don’t mind you asking,” Seremela replied quietly. “But it isn’t relevant to this conversation, and I would rather not discuss it.”

“Time,” Carling murmured. Past, present and future. It would seem the Oracle’s ability to prophesy was immersed with it. She rubbed her forehead and tried to focus. She looked up to find Rune studying her.

His face was grave, his eyes concerned. When she looked at him, he squeezed her shoulder. He said to Seremela, “What would you say about the properties of venom to someone who is nonmedical—namely, me?”

The medusa regarded him for a few moments. Her head snakes had slipped over her shoulders to pool in her lap in a coiled mass. Most seemed to have gone asleep, although a few still watched Rune and Carling. Seremela ran her fingers lightly over them. “The very first thing I would say to anyone is, this area of toxicology was not my focus of study in med school, so I can’t speak as any kind of expert. Given that, the properties of venom are extremely complex and can contain different toxins for different cells and tissues of the body. It can also have some surprisingly beneficial properties, such as bee venom treatments for MS patients, or a derivative of a Malaysian pit viper venom to treat stroke victims. Preliminary studies have also indicated that snake venom can slow the growth of some cancerous tumors. It’s a fascinating field of study. So much depends on the venomous species and of course their species of prey.”