Read Online Bound by the Vampire Queen by Joey W. Hill - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Joey W. Hill
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could impact vampires. When they met, she’d dismissed the idea that Ennui would ever affect her.
“I’ve seen things, Jacob. I’ve met Chinese dragons >whose whiskers feel like feathers when they brush them across your face. I’ve seen wars begin and end. Seen people do so many things I didn’t expect, and many things I did expect, and dreaded.
That is why the Ennui does not affect me… Life can be intensely amazing, or quietly desperate, as Thoreau said. If you wake each day with a genuine awareness which allows you to appreciate everything as if you were seeing it for the very first time… or the last.”
But he also knew such a mental ill ness could hit when a person’s defenses were low, and she’d taken so many emotional blows these past few years…
You are worrying for me. You know I worry about nothing when you are at my side.
“Yes, my lady.” He smiled against her skin.
“Apparently, you don’t need a vampire’s ability to be able to read my mind.”
“You rarely close your mind to me. Though you could do that anytime you wished now, as a vampire.”
“But never as your servant.”
“I think we are the most confusing relationship the vampire world has ever experienced. Certainly the most confusing one I’ve ever experienced.” That made him laugh outright, but he nodded toward two rose bushes. Bran lay between them, a look of sufferance on his face as Whiskers occupied the valley between the dog’s shoulders in a neat bread loaf shape, purring. “There are other, far more confusing relationships, my lady. The world is a mysterious place.”
Chapter 4
BASED on what Keldwyn had said about the dryad’s possible condition when freed, they’d told Ingram that, when they located her, they would be going straight from her tree to the nearest possible Fae portal. However, any hopes that might happen the first night, or even the second, came to naught.
On the third night, after they sent their usual mental greeting to Kane upon his rising, and set out at dark to resume their search, Lyssa had only one comment.
“When we finally find this dryad, I never want to see the underbelly of Atlanta again.” Jacob grunted. He was driving tonight, at the wheel of Lyssa’s Mercedes. They’d repeatedly gone through all the photos and information that John and Elijah had gathered, but it had narrowed things down little. “Still a needle in a haystack,” he said, glancing at the handheld screen his lady was scrolling through.
“Ye of little faith,” she said. “While you were getting dressed, I was thinking. Keldwyn did give us some clues. A twenty-year-old tree, downtown, but not in a park. Surrounded by asphalt or concrete.”
“Which narrows it down to a few thousand trees. A lot of businesses have trees in their landscaping.”
“Only this tree wouldn’t fit the landscaping, not necessarily. She was trapped there, so wherever she froze, for lack of better word, it should stand out.
And the lore says dryads favored certain types of trees. Oaks, hawthorne, rowan. But this is also a female dryad.” She studied the satellite photo in her hand, but her mind wasn’t on it. “Son of a bitch.”
“My lady?”
She smiled, a bit grimly. “I think Keldwyn gave us another, quite significant clue. Have you ever known him to volunteer a story, like he did about the cradle?”
“You mean when he was being an ass, telling us in a not-so-roundabout way that we don’t belong together?”
“That was the distraction. Males think with their cocks far too often.” She teased his knee with her long fingernails. “I looked up the story. The tree was a will ow.”
Capturing her hand, he kissed it. “I defer to your estrogen-driven logic, my lady. And please tell me that narrows things down so we won’t be forced to endure Atlanta traffic one more night. Otherwise, tomorrow night we’re having Ingram drive and we'll put John in a sleeping bag in the limo. We'll cal it camping in
“I’ve seen things, Jacob. I’ve met Chinese dragons >whose whiskers feel like feathers when they brush them across your face. I’ve seen wars begin and end. Seen people do so many things I didn’t expect, and many things I did expect, and dreaded.
That is why the Ennui does not affect me… Life can be intensely amazing, or quietly desperate, as Thoreau said. If you wake each day with a genuine awareness which allows you to appreciate everything as if you were seeing it for the very first time… or the last.”
But he also knew such a mental ill ness could hit when a person’s defenses were low, and she’d taken so many emotional blows these past few years…
You are worrying for me. You know I worry about nothing when you are at my side.
“Yes, my lady.” He smiled against her skin.
“Apparently, you don’t need a vampire’s ability to be able to read my mind.”
“You rarely close your mind to me. Though you could do that anytime you wished now, as a vampire.”
“But never as your servant.”
“I think we are the most confusing relationship the vampire world has ever experienced. Certainly the most confusing one I’ve ever experienced.” That made him laugh outright, but he nodded toward two rose bushes. Bran lay between them, a look of sufferance on his face as Whiskers occupied the valley between the dog’s shoulders in a neat bread loaf shape, purring. “There are other, far more confusing relationships, my lady. The world is a mysterious place.”
Chapter 4
BASED on what Keldwyn had said about the dryad’s possible condition when freed, they’d told Ingram that, when they located her, they would be going straight from her tree to the nearest possible Fae portal. However, any hopes that might happen the first night, or even the second, came to naught.
On the third night, after they sent their usual mental greeting to Kane upon his rising, and set out at dark to resume their search, Lyssa had only one comment.
“When we finally find this dryad, I never want to see the underbelly of Atlanta again.” Jacob grunted. He was driving tonight, at the wheel of Lyssa’s Mercedes. They’d repeatedly gone through all the photos and information that John and Elijah had gathered, but it had narrowed things down little. “Still a needle in a haystack,” he said, glancing at the handheld screen his lady was scrolling through.
“Ye of little faith,” she said. “While you were getting dressed, I was thinking. Keldwyn did give us some clues. A twenty-year-old tree, downtown, but not in a park. Surrounded by asphalt or concrete.”
“Which narrows it down to a few thousand trees. A lot of businesses have trees in their landscaping.”
“Only this tree wouldn’t fit the landscaping, not necessarily. She was trapped there, so wherever she froze, for lack of better word, it should stand out.
And the lore says dryads favored certain types of trees. Oaks, hawthorne, rowan. But this is also a female dryad.” She studied the satellite photo in her hand, but her mind wasn’t on it. “Son of a bitch.”
“My lady?”
She smiled, a bit grimly. “I think Keldwyn gave us another, quite significant clue. Have you ever known him to volunteer a story, like he did about the cradle?”
“You mean when he was being an ass, telling us in a not-so-roundabout way that we don’t belong together?”
“That was the distraction. Males think with their cocks far too often.” She teased his knee with her long fingernails. “I looked up the story. The tree was a will ow.”
Capturing her hand, he kissed it. “I defer to your estrogen-driven logic, my lady. And please tell me that narrows things down so we won’t be forced to endure Atlanta traffic one more night. Otherwise, tomorrow night we’re having Ingram drive and we'll put John in a sleeping bag in the limo. We'll cal it camping in
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