Chapter 42

  Lia awoke to hear Snow and Sage talking softly near the hearth. She laid there a moment curiously listening to them discussing a goddess and some devourer creature while two male voices were arguing over how to cook fish. While she wanted to stay focused on what Snow and Sage were talking about, she couldn’t help but realize that one of those male voices was Titus. The fact that he was arguing about fish lifted her spirits. Clearly something had happened, and Titus had returned – not as an adversary but as a friend. Quietly, she crept up the basement steps and peeked through to find Titus and Max debating how much heat and what pan were needed to cook some fish and vegetables. She could almost giggle at the sight.

  “Listen, I grew up on this lake, I know how to cook the fish that swim there.”

  “I’m telling you, you’re going to burn’em. They’re too small.”

  “What the hell would you know about cooking?”

  “Enough to know you’re going to burn’em.”

  Lia cleared her throat to announce herself. Both men looked up. Titus smiled and Max scowled.

  “Hi Lia. I’m glad to see you,” Titus said.

  “I’m glad you came back to us, my hero,” Lia replied echoing his warm smile.

  Max’s brow furrowed quizzically with the odd reply before interjecting. “Out of the way, bloodsucker. There isn’t enough room in here for all of us.”

  Titus’s smile disappeared briefly with the rudeness. He shot Max a look of disapproval, which the other man ignored.

  “Why don’t you let me cook?” Lia asked as she let the insult roll right off her.

  “Since when do vampires know how to cook?” Max put his shoulder in the way before she could come up to the prep table.

  “Since I was once a capable serving girl for a fine family. I’ll have you know that I knew my way around a castle kitchen well before your grandfather was born,” she said as she nudged her hip in and pressed him to the side. Her strength outmatched his easily as she pressed him out of the way.

  Titus smirked. “She might have better luck than either of us.” Max gave him a sharp scowl in response. Titus took it without offense and instead slapped a hand on his shoulder and coaxed him back into the living room.

  There, Snow and Sage had stopped their conversation as the two men walked over. Lia didn’t need extraordinary hearing to listen in as she prepped the fish along with some vegetables and potatoes.

  “Lia’s going to handle the cooking,” Titus announced.

  “Oh, thank the goddess,” Sage whispered.

  Snow smirked.

  In the kitchen, Lia smirked too.

  Max rolled his eyes and crossed his arms before leaning against the mantle above the hearth. “So, have either of you decided what happens next?”

  “As much as I want to give aid to Avery in Vernin, we need to understand what the saviors are doing… or more precisely, what this Devourer is doing with them,” Snow explained as he picked himself up off the floor.

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  “You’re not taking Sage with you,” Max made it sound final. Lia had watched him repeatedly be protective of Sage over the past week, but the tone in his voice and the fact that Sage looked a little paler than usual meant something else had happened.

  Lia sighed. While she appreciated her newfound friends, she always seemed to be on the outskirts of whatever was happening. Of course they would fill her in later, but it didn’t sway the feeling that she wasn’t in the same cart with them. That she was more like a spare horse tethered behind, being pulled along rather than working with the group. And the feeling had only become worse with time as she healed and regained her full strength. In fact, she had begun to wonder if she truly needed to stay a charge in Snow’s care. The resurrectionist had done plenty, and never treated her ill, but perhaps she could be on her own now.

  “No. I am not. She is going to stay here and so is Lia,” Snow replied. Lia’s ears perked up.

  “No. That vampire is NOT staying here.” Max turned to Sage. “You said it was only for a week or so. She’s not staying here. She’ll rip the town apart.”

  Lia scowled as she heard this. She had been nothing but perfect since she arrived here. Sage had lost a total of only four goats. And Lia would have had less if she hadn’t been healing from the lingering effects of the burns. The steady supply of blood for the past week or so had reduced the wounds to nothing but a pale pink shadow. She felt proper strength in her body again and could even shift easily.

  “Max, she hasn’t done anything wrong. You’ve been to town every day this week. Is anyone missing? Is anyone hurt? If she was causing a problem, we would have heard it by now,” Sage argued it gently.

  A smile then replaced Lia’s scowl. Snow had been right about Sage. She was wise, patient, and accepting. She had to be to put up with Max. But Lia would be lying if she said she didn’t understand Max’s attitude. This is why he’s so protective. He too knows that Sage would open her hand to anyone in need… regardless of consequences.

  “What if you’re caught harboring her?” Max added. “The saviors will take it as an excuse to turn this place upside down… or worse.”

  “If I may,” Lia stepped out of the kitchen and all four turned their attention to her.

  “Yes?” Snow replied, opening the floor to her.

  “Perhaps it’s time I find my own path.” She saw Snow about to talk and continued before he could. “Of course, I appreciate what you were trying to do, and I may still wish to meet your friends someday. It might be that you’re right. That I will find Lord Avery’s lands a safer place. But I feel there is more happening here and maybe I can be of use.”

  “How?” Max replied skeptically.

  Lia kept her focus on Snow as she replied. “Remember the wolves? You said they were traveling east, that there was a new union under Cernac?”

  Snow nodded and his face grew solemn with the realization of what she was going to suggest. “But that would be a dangerous journey for a vampire traveling alone. And I don’t know if this union is anything more than rumors.”

  “Then maybe I can find out,” Lia replied. “I am fully healed now. And at least I know there is somewhere I can come back to that will welcome me.” Lia glanced at Max. “For the most part.”

  “Are you saying you want to go east and see what’s out there?” Titus was in disbelief.

  “Why not?” Lia shrugged. “Then you’d know what’s happening out there. Whether the rumors are true.”

  The more she argued for it, the more Lia felt sure of her choice. When Snow had freed her from the collar, Lia had looked out on the great wide world in fear. It was like standing in the middle of the ocean with nothing but the same waves on any side, with only endless miles of empty water stretching far to the horizon. And just like a sailor marooned on a raft, she had nowhere to go and felt trapped. But it wasn’t so now.

  Snow and his friends had given her a harbor to call her own where she could stay or sail from. She was no longer adrift, and the security gave her heart room to dream of more than just survival. She had been nothing but a pretty serving girl and a half-hearted vampire all her long life, but here was a chance now to be something more. And she had been curious of these creatures all moving east; curious if Cernac was truly behind this or if everyone was being misled to their death.

  She wanted to go. Not to leave permanently, but to see the world and be a help to her friends – whom she could always return to.

  Lia watched all three look to each other for some kind of response. Sage slowly got up from her chair and took her shawl with her as she stepped closer to Lia. With one hand she reached out and took Lia’s with a tender grasp.

  “I saw this,” she said solemnly. “And I want you to know this: not all who travel believe in this union. And beware the man with the scars. He has his own agenda.”