Chapter 196: The Hidden Power of a Witch’s Blood (Part Two)
"Then I’m happy," Ashlynn said, closing her eyes and resting her head against Nyrielle’s chest. The sound of the vampire’s heartbeat in time with the echo of that heartbeat in her own chest had become a powerful talisman of connection in Ashlynn’s heart and she reveled in both the sound of her lover’s heartbeat and the faint fragrance of lavender soap that clung to her even after such a long and eventful day.
"You’ve given me so much. Taught me so much, protected me from my enemies, and helped me to grow stronger. I felt like I hadn’t given you anything to be worthy of all that you’ve done for me."
"With this," she said, opening her eyes and looking up at Nyrielle through eyelashes that held joyous tears. "I feel like I’ve given you something as priceless as what you’ve given me."
"You know that I will treasure you for our entire lives," Nyrielle said, giving Ashlynn a tender smile before she continued. She didn’t want to say what came next but she wanted even less for Jacques to be the one to tell Ashlynn.
"There is one more thing you should know about what you could mean to me," the vampire said with great reluctance. "It’s why Jacques thinks he might need to protect you from me. A witch’s blood is a powerful, potent thing. Look at how much you have changed me just by allowing me to feed once or twice a month."
"You feed more than that," Ashlynn teased, stretching her face toward Nyrielle and kissing her lips firmly enough to bite gently on the vampire’s lower lip. "You sample me regularly when we kiss."
"I suppose that’s part of why you’ve transformed me so much, so quickly," Nyrielle said with a warm smile. "But there is a different value that a witch’s blood can offer a vampire. I’ve explained to you that a vampire is balanced on the edge between life and death."
"There are many things that can pull even a True Vampire over the edge into the dark oblivion of death," she said. "We are timeless, ageless, and undying, but we are not truly immortal. We can still die and many of us have over the years. We can be killed. But there is also a path for us to live again."
"A witch’s blood," Ashlynn whispered, her face growing pale as she realized what Nyrielle was building toward. "But, you taught me in the very beginning with sorcery, energy has to come from somewhere. For a vampire to ’live’ again... the witch must die?"
She said it as a question, but deep in her heart, Ashlynn already knew the answer. No wonder the Mother of Thorns had sent a witch like Jacques to protect Ashlynn, not just from Nyrielle but perhaps from the other vampires around her. Even if Ashlynn trusted Nyrielle with her life, the temptation that a witch’s blood represented couldn’t be underestimated.