Poppy lifted her head. “He needs to feed,” she said, hands clasping my cheeks. “And he needs food and fresh, clean water.” She paused as I tensed. Her gaze flicked to the hip bath, and her chest rose with a sharp inhale. “To drink.”
To drink.
Not to bathe.
She knew. Somehow, she’d figured it out. Or Kieran had told her. Probably Kieran, but still, she remembered.
“He has been given all those things,” the Blood Queen answered. “And as you can see, he has made no use of all that fresh water provided to him.”
Her eyes closed briefly. “He has only been given enough to survive. He needs food. Real food. And he needs—”
“Blood. Which he has also been provided. If he hadn’t, you wouldn’t be sitting in his lap right now. You’d be lying there with your throat torn open,” Isbeth stated.
What she’d said was blunt. Cruel. But it was the truth. What little they’d given me had pushed me to the edge. But without it? I would be gone.
Poppy moved her hand down, bringing her wrist close to my mouth. Even in the faint light, I saw the pale blue veins under her skin. My lips parted. Muscles tensed painfully—
“I did not give you permission to bleed for him.” The Blood Queen’s voice was closer, but I couldn’t look away from that vein.
“I don’t need your permission,” Poppy spat.
“I would have to disagree.”
Poppy’s head cut in her direction. “Try and stop me.”
There was a beat of silence. “And what? You bring this stone down on my head as you promised? If so, you will bring it down on all of us.”
“So be it,” Poppy hissed.
“She’ll do it,” I said, curling my right hand around her arm, forcing my eyes away from her wrist. “And I kind of want to see her do it.”
Isbeth’s lip curled. “You would want something so idiotic.”
I smiled at her.
“Whatever.” Isbeth threw up a hand. “Feed him and get it over with. This whole scene is tiresome.”
Poppy twisted back to me, folding her hand around the nape of my neck. “Feed.”
My gaze dropped to that vein again. I hesitated, even as my stomach clenched. Her blood…it was powerful, and she’d pulled me back from the edge before. But she needed her strength. I didn’t know if she had learned if she needed to feed or not, and I wasn’t about to ask that in our present company. I wouldn’t risk her well-being.
I lowered my mouth to her wrist, dropping a kiss to that vein as I braced myself against the surge of need and hunger that rose. I didn’t block the pain. I quieted it, knowing she would search for it. “I don’t need to feed.”
“Yes, you do.” Poppy dipped her head. “You need blood.”
“Your touch…it pulled me back. That was enough.” I lowered her wrist.
Her breath snagged. “Cas—”
I groaned, feeling the sound of my name in a way she would likely find highly inappropriate given the situation. “It’s better that I don’t.”
Poppy’s brows creased with frustration. “Then food. I want food brought in. Now.”
“Food will be brought to him,” Callum answered, and it took everything in me not to laugh. Stale bread? Moldy cheese. Yeah, food.
“Then go get it,” Poppy ordered. “Now.”
I fought another smile. Oh, how she fought for me. “My Queen,” I whispered, trailing my fingers along the curve of her jaw. “So demanding.”
“Yes. That she is,” the Blood Queen stated coolly. “She will also be leaving your embrace.”
“No.” She curled her arm around my shoulders. “I’m not leaving him. I will stay right here with him.”
“That was not a part of the deal. You promised that you would speak with me.”
“I promised to talk to you. I didn’t agree to do so in any certain location,” Poppy shot back.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Isbeth muttered. “You expect me to stay down here?”
“I don’t care what you do,” Poppy snapped.
“You should. If you think I will allow you, my daughter, to stay down here, you are foolishly mistaken.”
“You are holding a King here,” Poppy exclaimed, her eyes flashing. “The man your daughter is married to.”
“Oh, now you recognize yourself as my daughter?” Isbeth laughed, and the sound was like falling ice. “You are testing my patience, Penellaphe.”