Those are some of my favorites.
Eventually, we get to a fork in the path but continue down the right side.
There’s a second fork at the bottom of that path, and this time Jaxon takes us to the left. We go through another set of safeguards and then suddenly, everything flattens out. We’re in a huge room, filled with so many lit candles that, after the dark, I have to blink against the glare of them all.
“What is this place?” I whisper to Jaxon, because it seems like the kind of place that demands a whisper. Wide open, with high ceilings and brilliant rock and ice formations in all directions, it’s the most stunning natural wonder I’ve ever seen.
The place feels like a dream…at least until I glance toward one of the corners and realize there are chains and cuffs jammed into the ceiling—right above a couple of bloodstained buckets. There’s no one in the cuffs right now, but the fact that they exist at all takes away my awe at the beauty of the room.
Jaxon sees where I’m looking—it’s hard to be subtle when you imagine humans being hung and drained of their blood—and steps forward to deliberately block my view. I don’t argue with him; I already have a pretty good idea I’m going to be seeing that setup in my nightmares for some time to come. I don’t need to see it in real life again. Ever.
Jaxon seems to feel the same way, because he’s tugging me over to the largest arch pretty quickly now, even though the floor is still slippery and uneven.
“Ready?” he asks, right before we get there.
I nod, because honestly, what else am I going to do? And then, with Jaxon’s arm wrapped tightly around my shoulders, I walk straight through the archway to meet the Bloodletter.
31
Welcome to the
Ice Age
I don’t know what I’m expecting when I walk through that frozen archway, but the perfectly put-together living room in front of me is. Not. It.
The room is gorgeous, the ceiling and walls decorated with more rock and ice formations…and behind glass, one very large expressionist painting of a field of poppies in all the shades of red and blue and green and gold.
I’m transfixed by it, much the way I was by the Klimt I saw in Jaxon’s room when I first got to Katmere. Partly because it is beautiful and partly because the closer I get to it, the more convinced I become that the painting is an original Monet.
Then again, when you’ve been alive for thousands of years, I guess it’s easier to get your hands on the works of the masters—maybe even before they became masters.
The rest of the room looks like any living room anywhere—with an upgrade from standard to absolutely stunning. A gigantic rock fireplace dominates one of the side walls. Bookshelves line the room, filled with books bound in cracked and colorful leather, and a giant rug that looks like a bouquet of flowers exploded stretches across the massive floor.
In the center of the room, facing away from the fire, are two large wingback chairs in the same red as the poppies in the painting. Across from them, separated by a long rectangular glass coffee table, is a comfortable-looking sofa in harvest gold.
And sitting on the sofa, legs curled under her with a book in her lap, is a very sweet-looking old woman, with short gray curls and colorful reading glasses. She’s dressed in a silk caftan in swirling shades of blue, and her light-brown skin glows in the candlelight as she closes her book and deposits it on the glass table.
“Four visits in as many months,” she says, looking up at us with a soft smile. “Careful, Jaxon, or I’m going to start getting spoiled.”
Her voice sounds like she looks—sweet, cultured, calm—and I feel a little like I’m being punked. This is the most dangerous vampire in existence? This is the woman Jaxon refers to as the Bloodletter? She looks like she’d be more at home knitting and playing with her grandchildren than she ever would hanging people upside down from the ceiling to drain their blood.
But Jaxon is moving us toward her, his head angled down in the most submissive gesture I have ever seen from him, so this has to be her, fuzzy slippers and all.
“You could never be spoiled,” he answers as we come to a stop right in front of her. Or rather, Jaxon comes to a stop in front of her. I come to a stop several feet back, as Jaxon has deliberately angled his body between us. “I like the new color scheme.”
“I was overdue for a change. Spring is a time for renewal, after all.” She smiles ruefully. “Unless you’re an old vampire like myself.”
“Ancient isn’t the same as old,” Jaxon says to her, and I can tell from his voice that he means it. And also that he admires her a great deal, even if he doesn’t trust her completely.