Call Of The Dark

Emma was feeling… happy. She hummed the tune she knew as always as Ginger gave her a bath. Lazarus had left in the wee hours of the morning.

He had curled up against her all night and slept like a baby. She wanted to put her clothes on but he didn't allow it. She should have been ashamed of sleeping naked with a man for the first time, but she only felt… natural.

"Lady Gladys wants to see you m'lady," Ginger said as she scrubbed her shoulders. Where the hell did she get these bruises from? "You have bruises, m'lady. Should I call the healer?" Ginger was getting seriously suspicious about her. Emma wasn't the right girl for Lord Lazarus.

"No!" Emma said, wondering when she got them. Maybe when he had straddled her or when he was licking her all up down there. Her face burned and her ears too. A smile curved her lips up and she tried to bite it to not show her emotions to the maid, but her body gave away.

Ginger was now very suspicious. She was going to speak about it to Lord Lazarus, but she was scared that he might scold her back. She was going to speak about it to Maeve. Surely the goddess would stop her. Maeve was coming back in a few days.

"Is Lady Gladys sitting out in my bedchamber?" Emma asked to divert the topic.

"No, she is in her chamber and she has called you there," Ginger replied dryly.

"Okay…"

Emma was in front of Gladys's bedchamber an hour later. She liked her, but she didn't tell Lazarus about her, afraid that he would stop her from meeting her.

"Emmalyn," Glady said with a smile. "How have you been?"

"I am very well, Lady Gladys," Emma replied politely. "How have you been?"

"I am also well," Gladys said and held her hand. "Come, let's sit in my room today. It is pretty cold outside. A snow blizzard is on its way."

"Don't you have to sleep?" Emma asked as she walked in Gladys's room. This was the first time she had come there. It was beautiful. Red and gold fabric lined the walls and her bed. There was a gold canopy over her bed. The rug was a crimson and so soft that Emma's feet sank in it. A man was sitting on a chair and Emma noticed that his head was lolled to the right, blood dripping from it. He was unconscious. There were two punctures on his neck.

A shudder passed through Emma and she hesitated in coming inside.

"He is a blood vassal," Gladys explained. "You don't have to worry. He is here because he wanted to be here. We don't drink from those who are unwilling."

But Emma couldn't remove her eyes from the man. He was looking pale like a ghost as if all his blood was sucked out. She remembered seeing him in the village. He was a lord out there and a local merchant.

Gladys motioned her maids to help the men out. Two maids came instantly beside the man. They lifted him and took him out.

"He will be fine in a day," Gladys said with another smile as she tugged Emma further in her room.

Emma took a deep breath in as she tried to come to terms with it. "What was his name?" she asked in a shaky voice.

"Amaedus." Gladys took her to the couch that was near the fire hearth. She sat on it and patted the empty space next to her. "Sit."

Emma sat, trying her best to think of anything but Amaedus.

"So, how was your day, Emma? Or rather night?" she chuckled.

Emma instantly remembered the passionate night with Lazarus and her cheeks burned so hot that she thought of removing her cape. "It was… good."

Gladys laughed. "Emma, you don't have to hide from me. You are smelling of him."

"But I took a bath!" she sputtered.

Gladys laughed again. "So what? We are vampires and our smells are enhanced."

That made her cheeks burn all the more. She didn't know where to look now. She bunched up her gown in her lap.

"I believe you had a sleepless night," Gladys winked as she gave her tea.

She bit her lip as she accepted the tea. It was the same and Emma loved its spicy smell. Her gaze fell on Gladys and she noticed that Gladys was looking at her nape.

"Didn't he pierce his fangs in you yet?" she asked, looking over the rim of her cup.

Emma shook her head. "No…"

"That's strange," Gladys said. "He is in his mating phase and he hasn't even pierced his fangs in you?"

Emma shrugged. "I don't think we have reached that level." Though the idea of him sinking fangs in her seemed… enticing.

"Well then you should coax him into it."

"Why?" she asked. "I won't force him into doing something he doesn't want to."

Gladys put her tea cup on the table and smiled at Emma. "I understand. You shouldn't force him into doing anything. But you are his mate. I would love to see his mark on you. And more than me, he would love to see his mark on you." She placed her hand on Emma's and gently rubbed her knuckles. "Lazarus is confused right now. If he claims you and marks you, he is afraid that you will be injured and become his blood slave."

"What is a blood slave?" Emma asked, her panic returning.

"It is natural between mates. You will be tethered to him by soul and then no matter what, he won't be able to cast your soul out because that would hurt him greatly."

Emma gasped. Her eyes became wide. That was why Lazarus wasn't claiming her? She had to increase her efforts to attract him.

---

Maeve was in Sgiáth Bio. She had left the moment she received the message from her lover Ailill. Ailill was a fae but he wasn't living in Vilinski. He was living in a different realm, in a world called Araniea in the Hydra Kingdom. He was an outcast, a rogue.

Lazarus or any of the royals didn't know about him.

And he was Maeve's mate.