Chapter 22

M onday at the office felt totally anticlimactic until Padma and Edwin dragged me into the interrogation room and locked the door.

“You have potent blood,” Padma blurted.

They both stared at me, waiting for a response.

“Um…thanks?”

She rolled her eyes. “No. Orina, there’s latent power in it. Harriet said so. We went over there for the books, and she was all…” She waved her hands around her face. “Messed up in the face.”

“She’s tainted, too,” Edwin said. “By something ancient.”

“And she said you were more than human,” Padma continued, “and your blood was helping her.”

I knew there was something more to the crazy doctor, but… “I think I’d know if I was more than human. The Order would have told me. They keep tabs on genealogy.”

“What if they hid it from you?” Edwin said.

“Why would they do that?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “But your blood is more than human, and they must know about it, and they haven’t told you, so…something is off.”

There was another possibility they weren’t considering. “Or…Harriet is lying, and there is nothing special about my blood.”

“Then why request more of it?” Padma pointed out.

I shrugged. “I don’t know. But the only way to find out the truth is for me to ask the Order point-blank.”

“No!” they both said in unison, panic etched on their faces.

“They must know,” Padma said. “Orina, they would have your blood on file, everything about you, and they never told you, and that’s a huge red flag.”

“Because there isn’t anything to tell. Harriet is a crazy bitch who’s tainted by some ancient curse.”

“Then humor us,” Edwin said. “Let’s get a second opinion.”

“What about your friend?” Padma said. “That mageri, Lorenzo?”

“Yes!” Edwin agreed. “You can send him some of your blood.”

I wanted to brush this off because I would know if I was different. If I wasn’t pure human. I’d feel it, surely. An icy hand gripped my nape, reminding me of the darkness that lived inside me and the way that Ezekiel craved my blood. He’d used the word potent to describe it too. Maybe investigating this wasn’t such a bad idea.

“Fine, I’ll call him and arrange it.” The two of them visibly relaxed. “Then we have a whole day of canvasing.”

Edwin groaned. “I really hope someone recognizes our missing people.”

The sketches Padma had commissioned of our missing people had arrived this morning, so we were all set to go door to door. Lomax and Diago had gone missing in the same area, and there was no way that was a coincidence.

While the others got ready to leave for Brimswood, I shut myself in the interrogation room and called Lorenzo.

It rang for ages, and I was about to cut the call when he answered.

“Orina? Is everything all right?”

“Fine. I’m fine. You?”

“I’m doing well.”

“Great. Look, I hate to ask because you’ve already done so much, but I need another favor.”

“Orina, you can ask me for as many favors as you like. You know that. What do you need?”

“I need you to test my blood.”

He was silent for several moments. “Have you…Do you think you’re infected?”

“No! No, it’s not that. I just…There’s some debate over its potency. I want to check if there’s anything…different about it.”

“You’re wondering if you’re human.”

“Something like that.”

“Ask Holly to send me a sample and I’ll look into it. Personally.”

“Thank you.”

“Of course.”

“Is there any news on Nyx?”

“Nothing new.”

No news was good news, right? “All right, well…I best get going. And Lorenzo…thank you once again. For everything.”

I ended the call and went in search for Holly. Best to get this blood drawn and sent off today.

If there was something different about me, then I deserved to know, and if the Order had hidden it, then…well, the high-level operative that was coming to see me would have some explaining to do.

The week passed quickly, every day a bust when it came to canvasing, but we refused to lose hope. Holly made more tracker tincture, and we tracked two more missing people to the same spot as Lomax and Diago just outside the gates to Brimswood Park. The cases were obviously connected, and if we were going to solve them, we’d need more manpower, something the Order was unable to provide. The only other avenue of assistance was the Sangualex, so I dropped a call to Atlas, who graciously agreed to see what he could do to assist us.

Yeah, the days were busy, but the evenings stretched out long and empty. Ezekiel had retreated from me. Locked away in his quarters since our return. I was at a loose end without the need to chaperone him and found myself hanging in the kitchens with Ingrid most evenings.

She made the best baked treats, and I got to sample them all. Tonight, she was making a start on cinnamon twists, which she explained began with the perfect dough.

I watched her work with my feet propped on a stool, cup of tea and shortbread biscuits to hand.

“Where are the boys?” Ingrid asked, knuckle deep in dough. “I’m sure they’d be glad to spend time with you.”

“Are you trying to get rid of me?”

She looked up with a smile. “Hardly, dear, but I’m sure there are more exciting things to be doing than spending time with me.”

“I happen to like spending time with you.” I sipped my tea. “You feed me.”

She laughed lightly. “Yes, dear, I enjoy your company too. But…”

“But what?”

“Maybe you should be checking on Master Ezekiel?”

“His door knocker told me he wasn’t taking visitors.”

Ingrid frowned. “ Hmmmm …well, what about Master Ordell?”

“It’s best we keep a distance, and before you ask, Hemlock is a grumpy asshole. I did knock for him, but there was no answer. No clue where he is.”

“Oh, Master Hemlock is in the library. It’s where he spends most of his time, actually. It’s his favorite room in the castle.”

I sat up straighter. “You have a library?” I’d already finished the books I’d brought with me. “Wait…is it filled with old books written in Latin?”

She chuckled. “Some, but there are modern books too. Master Ezekiel likes his library to be up to date. It’s how he acclimatizes to each new century. Literature can tell you a lot about an era. You’ll find newspapers and magazines, brochures and pamphlets, and all the latest novels.”

I was already on my feet. “Can you show me? Please?”

Ingrid patted the dough and covered it with a cloth. “Of course I can, dear.”

Ingrid left me outside a set of double doors in a part of the castle I hadn’t fully explored yet, which explained why I hadn’t found the library.

I expected a room filled with books, but what I got was a ballroom-sized chamber with three floors of neatly arranged tomes accessible via silver steps and ladders and a forest of aisles on the ground floor that vanished into shadow. And sitting in the center of it all, stretched out in a huge armchair with a book, was Hemlock.

He glanced up as I entered, a frown appearing between his eyebrows. “Orina? Is everything all right?”

“Why didn’t you tell me this place had a library?” I wandered over to the nearest shelf and ran my fingers along the leather spines. “Classics…Where are the modern novels?”

“You read?” he asked.

“Don’t sound so surprised.”

He set his book down, unfurled his tall frame, and stretched. His hair was ruffled, his shirt creased, and he’d kicked off his boots. This was obviously a comfort spot for him, and I suddenly felt like an intruder.

“This way.” He padded into the stacks, and I followed.

It was gloomy in the aisles, the light from the main room barely trickling in, but there were small spotlights fixed to the shelves—crystals that cast a glow strong enough to read by.

The scent of leather and paper evoked nostalgia, bringing a sense of peace I only truly felt when lost among the pages of a good book. Hemlock obviously had a similar relationship with literature because this version of him, here, surrounded by tomes was the most unwound, relaxed iteration I’d been presented with.

“Look, I didn’t mean to disturb you. I’ll just take a couple of books and leave you to it.”

He threw an amused glance over his shoulder. “Do I look disturbed?”

“Is this a trick question?”

“Why would you think that?” There was a smile to his voice now.

“Because you’re being nice to me.”

“Blunt as always. Ordell and I agreed to be supportive, didn’t we? And considering he can’t be around you much, it falls to me to be your point of contact.”

“You haven’t been around much yourself this past week.”

“I’m never far, Orina, but I won’t be following you around and checking up on you. That kind of vigilance is reserved for out in the field.”

He took a right at the intersection of books. How large was this room?

“So you think I’m safe here now.”

He was silent for several beats. “Yes. I don’t believe Ezekiel will hurt you now.”

Something had changed between the vampire king and me, and Hemlock and Ordell must have sensed it too.

“Hemlock…do you think…Do you think he’ll ever be whole again?”

He stopped and turned to me, his face hidden in shadow. “Do you want him to be?”

“If you’d asked me that a week ago, I would have told you I didn’t care either way, as long as he kept his fangs to himself, but now…Now I want him to heal. I want him to be whole again.”

“Why?” Hemlock stepped closer, and his scent mingled with the bookish aroma of the library. “Why do you want that?”

His question irritated me. “Because I want to meet that person.”

“Why?”

Because if there was good in him, real good, then I could justify my attraction. I could stop feeling like a freak for being drawn to him.

“Orina?” He lightly touched my cheek with his gloved hand. “Why?”

I pulled away. “I don’t know, okay?” The lie came easily.

He exhaled shakily. “He killed Agatha and many innocents. That won’t change.”

“I know, and that’s a guilt he’ll have to deal with once he has his humanity back.” I fixed a smile on my face. “And now I’m done talking about this. I need books.”

Hemlock pressed his lips together, and I sensed that he was battling with the desire to say more. Thankfully, he resisted the urge, stepping back to indicate the shelf behind him. “Take your pick. The whole aisle is modern-day literature from the most recent era.”

“Thank you.” I slipped past him and into the aisle lined with brightly colored spines.

He lingered as if wrestling with whether to rekindle our conversation. I grabbed a random book, flipped to the blurb, and pretended to read. He stood there a few seconds longer before retreating with a sigh.

Only then did I focus on reading the blurb. An angst-ridden romance about a woman wrestling with her feelings for a man she claimed to despise. For fucksake. I made to shove the book back on the shelf then decided against it. Heck, maybe I’d learn something.