CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Late the next morning, Michael woke when he rolled over on a piece of folded paper. "What the hell?" he mumbled, fumbling under his shoulder. He sat up and unfolded the paper, wondering what time it was and where Selene had gone. His stomach grumbled with hunger. I've gone to Ziodex, Selene had written. I'll be back soon.

"Yeah, sure you will," he said to the emptiness. He crumpled the note and tossed it across the room. "Sure you will."

He had talked himself into showering when he spied Selene's new laptop. Manna from heaven. He pounced on it, finally discovering a diversion. He brought it back into bed with him and opened it. He became so engrossed that he didn't look up when he heard the lock turn, signaling Selene's return. He knew it was exceedingly childish, but he resolutely kept his eyes locked on the screen as he felt her sit down on the end of the bed.

"What's up?" he asked, moving one card beneath the other.

"Up?"

"What was so important that you couldn't wait for me?"

"Nothing."

"If it was nothing, then…fuck it. You know what? I'm giving up. I'm giving in. You didn't want me to go and so you left without me. No big deal. I can sit here and play with this laptop until you need me for something."

"What are you playing?" Selene asked in a wooden voice.

"Spider solitaire."

"Solitaire?"

"Yeah, you know; the card game."

"Yes, I know it is a card game. It just doesn't seem very entertaining."

"You've obviously never been to college. I used to play solitaire like a fiend. I know it sounds stupid but it helped me decompress and regroup. Play a few hands and and just about any mountain becomes a molehill." He finally looked at Selene. "So. What's up?"

"I told them Viktor and the other elders are dead. I also told them I am Viktor's heir. Then I asked for blood. It's in an insulated bag by the door."

"As much as it disturbs me to say this, I hope they were generous. I'm starving; let's eat!"

"Michael, are you…" Selene began.

"What? Am I manic? Bipolar?"

"No. I was going to ask if you were angry."

"Don't ask questions you have no interest in, Selene. It's bad form."

"What!"

"Sometime things have to hit me over the head before they make sense. But I get it now. You'll fuck me but you won't talk to me or include me in your agenda, whatever that is."

Selene eyed Michael with a jaundiced expression. 'I'm not giving any credence to what you just said to me. I'm hungry." She stood up and stalked to the door. Michael returned to his card game. He heard the unzip and zipping of a bag, followed by the slamming of a door. He grimaced at the predictability and closed the computer. Then he went in search of blood.

He was taking a deep breath in preparation to swallowing when the door opened again. Self consciously, he turned away before consuming the heavy red liquid. Selene waited until he finished before she spoke. She laid a hand on Michael's arm. "You're right, I know you are. I've been treating you horribly. I'm a soldier. I don't know any other way of doing things. I'm trying and trying. Don't give up yet."

He flashed a lopsided grin. "Well, I always back a fighter. Every time. So, you know what? Let's get out of these tiny rooms and find something to do that does not involve guns, blood, or monsters. Unless you're going back to Ziodex sometime today."

"I know it's counterproductive, but I don't want to talk to scientists and doctors yet. Kahn died less than twenty four hours ago. I'm just not ready."

"Selene, honey. Who cares about counter productivity? There is such a thing as keeping yourself sane."

"What did you call me?"

"You mean Kraven never called you honey?"

Selene gave Michael a slow, weighted smile. "He called me many things, Michael Corvin, but

'honey' wasn't one of them."

Michael raised an eyebrow. He pulled Selene into his arms and nibbled her neck. "Honey, honey, my beloved is sweeter than honey," he whispered as he nibbled his way to her shoulder, pulling the fabric aside as he went. "Let me be intoxicated…let me drown in your honey…" he whispered against the blade of her collarbone.

Selene sighed, running her hands down Michael's thighs. "I'll never understand what it is that you do to me," she whispered back to him.

He kissed the swell of her breasts and the hollow between them. And then he released her, stepped back. "If I don't put some clothes on, we will never get out that door."

And so it was that Selene became a tourist in her own homeland. For the next few months, she allowed Michael to show her the vistas of her own city. They strolled down Andrássy út, holding hands and peering into the windows of the boutiques by day. Sometimes they walked the paths of City Park as spring slowly returned, the century-old horse chestnuts in bloom. They explored Castle Hill. By night, they attended opera and ballet in the State House, Selene unable to take her eyes off Michael, resplendent in black tie. Several nights they snuck into the Király Baths, the locks no more than trinkets in Michael's hands. They made love under the Turkish dome, shafts of moonlight shimmering on the pool.

As the days passed, Selene began to lose the look of a warrior anticipating attack. She stopped scanning crowds for enemies and seemed somewhat relaxed. It was when she was no longer looked for her brethren around every corner that she was approached by a thin, nervous vampire in the early hours before dawn. He at last confirmed what she had feared but would not say...there were very few survivors of either great coven. The remaining vampires in Hungary were hidden away in small bands which called no one place home...their toehold tenuous, in constant flux. She was now the oldest known Eastern European vampire. And except for rumors of a small coven in Wales and one in Spain, she was quite possibly the oldest vampire in all of Europe or Asia. The New York coven had traveled across a great ocean only to die in a train car beside Amelia. This knowledge left her shaken and silent. Periodically, she returned to Ziodex for blood, but only as a source of food, not of knowledge. She turned away each time Michael suggested they volunteer genetic samples for research in a Ziodex lab. She had been profoundly affected by Kahn's death. She seemed to no longer have any interest in exploring whatever power or immunity she had inherited from Alexander Corvinus. When Michael asked her about stopping the war, she looked at him strangely. What war could continue when the armies were all gone?

She was no more forthcoming with her emotions than she had ever been. Michael stopped trying to elicit a response and hid his disappointment as best he could. All that was unspoken hung like a cloud over them, overshadowing their fragile bond. The only times the cloud completely lifted was at the moment of their physical joining. And so, Michael never refused her, never admitted exhaustion or disinterest. If at any time his passion was feigned or hollow, he hid it from her. In moments of reflection, he told himself that she would grow to love him as completely as he himself loved her. This stubborn belief in the goodness of others and his tendency to overlook any motive but the best ones would always be his greatest weakness, but also his greatest strength. He would not entertain any thoughts but the best ones of his taciturn lover, no matter how it hurt.

All she had do was turn to him and his response was immediate. In this, he was not ashamed. Loving her was not his obligation or her demand. She was his choice…the only free one he had. He had been given no say in what Lucian had done to him. Likewise, he had not had a choice in what Selene had done as well. It had been either death or her fangs. He had no choice in the blood he now ingested to sustain his existence. Nor was he strong enough to deny the ancient urges that led him to hunt under the yellow light of a full moon, returning in the pre-dawn, christened in gore. His only free, truly free decision was the one to love Selene. And that he did. He often fell asleep still inside of her, too spent and drained to speak, his cheek pressed to hers. And he woke scarce hours later, her hands and mouth upon him, rousing him again. He took from her the only thing she freely offered: her body. She rarely allowed him into the sanctuary of her heart. Still, he was confident that with enough time, she would lower her defenses.

The one thing he missed, the one thing his days and nights with Selene could not compensate for, was the trauma unit at Ste. István's, even though he realized his mortal life was no longer an avenue open to him. His sense of self-worth suffered, no matter how Selene tried to assure him that he had as much right to Viktor's wealth as she had. He was a descendant of Corvinus and in her estimation, he was Viktor's heir as much as she was. She waved away his concerns and changed the subject.

Despite everything, there were moments of joy as spring became summer. Selene had spent so long in forced darkness that she took great, great delight in daylight. The more she spent as a day walker, the more she craved the sun. She discovered a love of hiking, travelling with Michael over the wooded landscapes of Lake Balaton. Their stamina was, of course, boundless. They hiked for hours and hours, stopping only to plunge into the lake before resuming their journey. Seen from a distance, no one would assume they were anything but a young, athletic couple in love. Michael's hair became streaked with blond and to their astonishment; Selene's pale skin became very faintly tanned. Sometimes they slept beside the lake and woke to wondrous sunrises. It was a summer of luminous days followed by nights dark as velvet.