Part Three
Teth turned off the kitchen lights as they stepped into the hall. "Are you thirsty?" he asked Thierry. "I have a store-"
Thierry held his hand up and shook his head. "That's all right."
"Are you certain? I know the traveling took longer than expected."
They mounted the first of the stairs side by side. "It seems I need to feed less and less as time goes by," Thierry told him. "Or else I’ve grown more used to the hunger. I don’t know which."
"You seem less like a vampire now than when I last saw you."
"I do? In what way?"
"You’re....easier. Things are tense in your life, but you know they will pass. You’ve found peace."
Thierry ran the back of one knuckle down the side of Teth’s cheek. "I have. Would you like me to share a portion with you?"
"You’ve only been here an hour, isn’t it early to be handing out wisdom?"
"Worry less, Teth."
"Oh, but there’s so much to worry about," he replied, and the joking was only a hint in his tone.
They went down the hallway and into the room Mira had chosen for Hannah and Thierry to stay in. Dawn’s slow beginnings bathed the room. A space heater hummed.
For some reason, Teth couldn’t stop thinking about that night in Thierry’s study, when all his walls had come down. When he had fallen into Thierry’s strong arms to sob his frustrations and his fears. When Thierry had wiped the tears from his cheeks, saying only, "Trust me."
"I trust you," Teth had whispered again and again. "It’s them I can’t trust."
Even when Thierry’s words had carried him so far, he found a little place inside that was left wondering. He had seen many times the power of human fear, and knew also that in human eyes he was something to fear. So many years had passed since he’d walked among humans, spoken with them, done more than bite their fragile necks. Mira, despite her injuries, retained much of her 'shifter heritage, her scent, the funny shape of her hands, her liquid brown eyes. Before the trouble in Venice, he had found himself walking through crowds of humans, trying to look at each one and see the same depth inside them he knew existed inside each Night Person. The pure expanse of consciousness, of soul. It was inconceivable that these rapidly multiplying humans might be the same, might feel the same.
"Do not equate strength of the limbs with strength of the soul," Thierry had told him once.
But the possibility was overwhelming. Teth knew that if he accepted it as truth, he would hate himself. He would deserve the hatred of every human.
"They don't look like children," Thierry whispered, as they stood at the end of Hannah and Mira's bed. The girls lay side by side, their hands intertwined, Mira's forehead pressed against Hannah's chin.
"They aren’t children. No one this war has touched is a child any more."
Thierry’s turned his head to look at him, their eyes meeting in the dark. "Six months ago," Teth said, "I saw a lamia-human baby impaled on a stick and left in the sun to die. It couldn’t have been more than a day old. When she grows up, who will explain the scars?"
"She lived?"
"I took her to Ecatelina. The witches named her Menassa because it means ‘cause to forget.’ Forget the pain of all of this, they said, now that a child has come out of it. But I can’t forget."
Thierry’s hand touched the back of his neck. His fingers ran through Teth’s hair. "You saved her."
"I may very well have been responsible for her."
"Have you always been this inclined toward self-hated?"
Teth looked at Mira. Even in the slender, breaking dawn, he could see the scars on her neck. He could feel the bones cracking between his fingers. "Yes," he whispered.
Thierry leaned close. "She loves you, Teth."
"She has no choice."
"We always have a choice. When Hannah thought I had killed her in past lives, she walked away from me. I’ve seen people walk away from their soulmates."
"I’m not that strong. I’ve always been a slave to those I love. My mother, my brother, Giovanna."
He hadn’t spoken her name in a year, and Thierry smelled the dust on his breath.
"Giovanna changed you?"
"Yes. And my brother. I would have given her anything she asked. Dontien wants to see me, I keep asking him not to because I know if he comes I’ll give him whatever he wants. I think he’ll kill Mira, and I have no doubt it would kill me." He glanced at Thierry again. "We aren’t all as strong inside as you were."
Mira inhaled suddenly, as if she were about to wake up, but she only lay a sloppy kiss on Hannah’s cheek and fell back asleep. "Do you know the price on her head?" he asked, lowering his voice even further.
"The last my secretary told me, it was almost a billion."
"It’s more than doubled since then. They say she’s bewitched me."
"I will protect both of you."
"I’m not afraid of the Night World. It’s Dontien and Giovanna who frighten me." He paused. "And you."
Thierry’s hand came to rest again the base of his scull, warm. "I love you," Teth whispered. "Just like you always said I did. Isn’t that horrible? I could have respected you, worked with you, but now I love you and I'm going to be your pathetic slave for the rest of my life."
Thierry leaned close and whispered fiercely. "I don’t know what Giovanna and Dontien did to you. I don’t know how they used you, how they abused your love. But I couldn’t do it."
"Of course you could. You would do anything for your cause, I know that."
"Why did you ask me to come here? So that you could hurt me?"
"So that I could make love to your wife."
For the first time, he saw shock on Thierry’s face. He smiled, pained. "I’ve never been with a human. Not before I was changed, not afterward. Tell me, Thierry, does Hannah mean it when she moans? Would she feel me inside her? Will the petite morte take her, too?"
"Dear God," Thierry breathed, and he turned away. Teth watched him walk the length of the room and back. "I don’t know whether to be honored or offended."
"If she could forgive me," Teth said, "wouldn’t it be like part of humanity forgiving me?"
"Is that what this is about? She’s not a human ambassador, Teth."
"No, but she is your beloved. That alone tells me that she embodies parts of humanity, the parts you love. And...and if I could give her this, this little slice of virginity and pride...it would be greater than any promise I might make to you."
"When have I ever asked for promises?"
"Never. When have I ever wasted your trust?"
He turned back to Thierry, standing in the rich glow of the rising sun a dozen paces away. "Show me what it is in them that you love. Teach me that, and whatever Dontien says will mean nothing. I will love them as much as you do."
Thierry stared at him, for long minutes, then turned his eyes on Hannah. "I think I have the right to kill you for what you’ve said."
"I agree. So does Mira. She says not to let my guilty conscience torture me, but..."
Full dawn was upon them, orange and yellow light splashing over the bed and the carpets and their faces. "I can’t ask her to do that," Thierry said finally.
"But I have permission to ask her myself?"
Thierry’s voice was nothing but thin breath. "Yes."
Teth watched him walk away, down the long attic room to the door. "Thierry," he said as the door was opening. "Are you doing this for me or for your cause?"
Thierry considered a moment, and unexpectedly, a bitter smile came to his lips. "I’m doing it for her," he murmured, and then left.