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Stor her pillow to her with a deep contented sigh and felt a s at her lips And then she cah died The warmth turned to a chill that shivered froed

Vlad had been there

She sat up in the bed, scanning the darkness of the room around her The balcony doors were closed, their curtains still, blocking out the night beyond the in the shadows The luital clock beside the bed read 4:15 There were no other eyes glowing at her fro for the lamp just to be sure, found the switch after a couple of false starts, and turned it on

Light flooded the bedroo her The sensation was so real, she spun around to look behind her, but no one was there Even so, it felt as if so down her neck

Shivering, hugging herself, she moved across the room to the French doors of the balcony and tested the the dryness in her throat, she went to the closet and closed her hand around the cool brass doorknob She stiffened her spine and jerked it open

But no one was lurking inside Sighing in relief, she turned and ht, then scanning the roolanced behind it anyway

Nothing

She left the bathrooh it was a stupid, childish thing to do Dropping to her knees beside the bed, she gripped a handful of covers and lifted the there except an expanse of the same carpet that covered the rest of the floor And then she shook her head at her own foolishness The very notion of Vlad hiding under a bed It was ludicrous

She was alone

But he&039;d been there She was sure of it It hadn&039;t been just a drea of him for sixteen years She&039;d never felt like this upon waking She felt relaxed; fulfilled Sated

Sing hard, she ain, unlocked and opened them, then stepped out onto the balcony and faced the darkness

"Vlad? Where are you?"

The only ansas the gentle whisper of the windaround the eaves and the railing

"I know you&039;re out there, Vlad And I know you want that da Don&039;t you try to put it onyou"

There was still no answer She stood there for a long time as bits of the dream that wasn&039;t a dream came back to her She remembered the way he&039;d touched her, the way he&039;d

Don&039;t be stupid! It was , me he wants, not you! Never you!

The voice, familiar and hated, shouted the words inside her ripped her head and closed her eyes That ho she&039;d felt watching her Elisabeta! She was getting stronger again Rising up again

She closed her eyes, chasing away the shivers of fear racing through her body She had to focus on what he&039;d said, not on what he&039;d done

He&039;d said he didn&039;t have the ring

Had he been telling the truth? Maybe so Because if he had it, why hadn&039;t he put it on her last night? Why wait?

Perhaps because he still hadn&039;t located the rite that went along with it Maybe he was just waiting for the onehis ti to me

She heard his passionate whisper, a co out at the night "No part of s to you, Vlad Understand that I&039;irl I was before And I&039;ve been working with your kind for long enough to kno to shieldto be broken by a vampire I&039;ht she had told hiht But surely he couldn&039;t take that declaration seriously Not when she&039;d been asleep, believing it all to be a dreato convince et to ain, and you&039;ll have no say in the matter

"Shut up, Beta!"

She felt no response from Vlad, sed hard and lowered her head She&039;d loved every second of it But that didn&039;t ht He hadn&039;t asked He&039;d only taken

Given, actually But still She wondered briefly if she was truly angry that he&039;d touched her without asking, or was it ain when she&039;d longed for nothing else for all this time? He&039;d kept her asleep, used his power over her to keep her fro up She wanted to see him She wanted to throw her arms around him and weep for joy She wanted to tell hiht The man has come to murder me Get over it, Stormy"

Because it was true He hadn&039;t co, and for Elisabeta

"Don&039;t let it happen again," she whispered And on so "Just don&039;t"

She went back inside, locked the French doors and crawled back into the bed, deteret another hour or two of sleep before it was tiain tonight, she told herself It was too close to dawn for that

She only wished she could be as certain about Elisabeta The sleeping intruder had awoken, strong and ready for a fight It wasn&039;t one to which Stor forward

She rolled over, punched her pillow and closed her eyes And she did get the sleep she&039;d been so deteret But it was far fro iant hearth and yanked the dusty sheets fro a place for them to be comfortable on the ancient but still sturdy chairs He located food, canned steith gravy, certainly not cuisine, but she declared it edible and proved it by devouring every bit She was starved The castle&039;s caretakers, he told her, only cah he&039;d phoned ahead to tell them to prepare a room for her, the supplies they&039;d left in the pantry were inal Vlad Dracula," he told her at length

Stormy looked at him quickly "You&039;re not?"

"No I aht noas centuries old, already, when my travels took me to Romania I cannot help but think it was fate that led me there To her"

"Elisabeta?"

"Yes"

He was intense, his eyes focused on the dancing fire that painted his face in light and shadow, giving hi appearance And even , had been killed in battle before he was out of his teens, his body left to rot, unidentified and unclaimed His father never knehat had beco his lost son for so prince&039;s fate I&039;d heard it directly from the enemy who&039;d slain him That man panicked when he realized he&039;d killed the prince, knowing the vengeance the king would wreak should he learn of it So he stripped the prince of his clothes, obliterated his face and dragged his body into a stand of brush, never to be found" He lowered his head "When I arrived, the king -lost son I didn&039;t have the heart to kill the joy in the oldthe role"

"I see" She didn&039;t, not entirely, but she was eager to hear more of his story About Elisabeta, the wo to possess her at ti as Prince Vlad for nearly five years when I met her Welook "That&039;s it? You met her andto say about your courtship?"

Vlad lifted his brows, spearing her with his steady gaze "What else is there to say?"

"I don&039;t kno you met her Where What made you fall in love with her It must have been intense, if you married her so quickly"

"Intense" He turned his eyes toward the fire, stared into the snapping fla The details the details are uni that&039;s ied as if it didn&039;tto share his private hell with her Not now And maybe not ever "The outcome is the sa spilled at your feet, Teht Enemies had crossed our borders I led our soldiers to ly Bloody Many died I was struck down, but one of ed me into shelter and left hed, disappointed that he&039;d refused to go into detail about his time with Elisabeta She sensed that he didn&039;t trust her with that kind of power

"Was it luck that your soldier put you under cover?" she asked softly "Or did he know?"

Vlad glanced her way "No one really knehat I was But by then my father and s They all knew I detested daylight, took toThey knew I slept by day and that disturbing ed "They ers did Ru, even then"

"So it was you, not the original prince, who inspired all the stories," she said softly

"Yes It was me"

She nodded slowly, then sed the luruesos I have done in the past, but I won&039;t make excuses I returned to the castle to find my new bride dead And yes, I wreaked havoc on my enemies after that I was brutal Perhaps even insane, at the time But it&039;s done, and I can&039;t undo it"

She drew a breath and shivered a little "So you blamed them, your enemies, for her death?"

"It ell deserved"

"Did they kill her? Storm the castle while you were away and-" She broke off there because he was shaking his head "How did Elisabeta die, Vlad?"

He set his jaw, fixed his eyes on the fire "She received word that I had been killed in battle, and in her grief, pitched herself froaze toward her again She held her hand to her lips involuntarily and felt her eyes go daed and looked away

"Why do you do that?"

"Do what?" he asked without looking at her again

"Pretend it doesn&039;tti you up inside ever since"

"Don&039;t pretend to understand in-"

"You&039;ve spent all these years waiting for her to co for her Don&039;t try to pretend this obsession of yours isn&039;t based on unbearable pain, Vlad It won&039;t wash, not with me"

"My pain is not the subject of this conversation You wanted to know about Elisabeta I&039; you about her"

"Not really," she said "But ether fro to share Go on, Vlad Finish the story What happened next?"

"Her body lay in the chapel My dear friend Rhiannon had arrived in my absence It was she who told me what had led to Beta&039;s death And she told me more, as well She told me that Elisabeta would return to me in five centuries"

She nodded slowly "I know of Rhiannon She&039;s well versed in the occult arts, or so the stories go Magick, divination, prophecy"

"She was a priestess of Isis, after all"

"So you believed her"

"Believed her? Yes But I was not convinced Elisabeta&039;s return would be enough I wanted to ensure that she would remember me, that she would still be the woain"

Tempest rose fro down at hi his view of the flames, so he had little choice but to look at her instead "How could you do that?"

"I couldn&039;t But I knew of those who could Rhiannon took her leave, and I hadback sorcerers, witches, ed them with the task, and they assuredfrohtly and held within its circle The told , and that when she returned, I need only replace it on her finger and perform the rite contained in the scroll to restore her completely"

He went quiet and watched her face, her eyes, awaiting her response She stared at him, her eyes moist "And you think I&039; and scroll, you can make me remember the past?"

He nodded slowly "I am not convinced you are her Not yet But if you are, then I think the rite would accomplish it, yes"

Stormy closed her eyes, lowered her head Vlad rose to his feet and began to pace "We were attacked after burying her, by the sa in the days prior to her death Aers, the priests Everyone Even me"

She frowned, but then it faded as realization dawned "But you revived"

"I did, just before sunrise Butof value The ring and the scroll were gone"

Heone hand on the huge stone hearth and staring into the flaht you here, to Roht return on its own"

"Not my memories," she said, her throat dry "Hers And so far that&039;s not happening, Vlad"

"No Nor would it, not in this castle She never set foot here, as far as I know No, it&039;s the places she lived that I want to show you" He looked toward the"But dawn is coht I&039;ll take you to the village To my father&039;s castle To the places she knew Perhaps perhaps it will stir soot no doubt It&039;ll probably stir her to life She&039;ll take over, and I won&039;t have any control over my own body,that is, Vlad I don&039;t want to go through it again"