Chapter 29: Vampire Bite
WINTER TERM - January 16th
It didn't feel like a dream.
It wasn't one. Couldn't have been.
Ianthe stood at the foot of my bed. This wasn't the bed in my flat in Nizari with the little dragons carved into the headboard, or her bed at the Stag's Court, with its horrible celadon canopy. This was my bed at the Midnight Court, the standard set in all the Vodalysa suites with the simple dark wood bed frame.
She was playing with a strand of her long white hair, though her deep red eyes were fixed on me. "You really left Caburh..." her voice was clear in a way it never had been. It wasn't in my head. "At least Alden's brat put you up in your own room. He must really like you."
She ran a hand up the side of the bed, coming closer. She wore a sheer white nightgown with lace on the hem and sleeves. Her lips were red - a warning, an omen, a terror.
I couldn't move, couldn't speak. I blinked. This couldn't have been a dream.
She reached out and set her hand atop my quilt, over my leg. I could feel the pressure of her touch. How the hell was she here?
I was still paralyzed. I didn't have the option to move or speak, but the feeling of her hand suddenly on me again was enough to tell me I may have been stunned into immobility even if I could have moved anyway. She wasn't supposed to find me.
Her lips twisted into a cruel smile and without warning, she jumped up onto the bed and crawled up over me. I felt her. Ianthe wasn't physically heavy, she never had been, but she wasn't trying to keep from hurting me. The palms of her hands pushed into my gut, my chest, my shoulders. Her knees bore into my thighs, my waist. She must have known I couldn't shake her off me. Even any kind of involuntary reflex seemed impossible.
"Oh, Zephyr." She hovered just over my face. I felt her hand brush through my hair. "Have your fun with the prince while you can. You'll always be mine."