Broken Promise Page 3

  He was very quiet, for a human.

  “Sebastian,” I called, when I heard his soft step.

  He stepped around the sides of the stall, the long fronts of a dark cloak swirling around his boots. He had removed the distinct red coat and wore only the black waistcoat over his shirt. No sword disturbed the folds of the cloak, either. But I could see the butt of one of the dueling pistols still tucked into his sash.

  He remained standing at the entrance to the stall. “What are you doing here, Nathanial?” he demanded.

  I got to my feet. “Ah. No hello. No welcome words. You’re still angry with me.”

  “Is that why you came here?” he replied. “Nial, I have a battle to plan for and men to see to. I do not have time to pander to your hurt feelings.”

  His life as an officer had changed him in more ways than just his thinking. He was tanned, his face leaner than it had been. He had been working hard, physically. There was a toughness to him that had been missing before. It was the determination that comes with leadership.

  “I’m not here to salve hurt feelings,” I said shortly. “I have none.”

  “Then you have surprised me. Nathanial—”

  “I was wrong,” I said quickly.

  He hesitated and I took the moment, for I didn’t know how many moments he would give me, now. “I was abysmally wrong. Abjectly so.”

  The corner of his mouth lifted. “That is what I told you in Edinburgh, that night. Seven years ago.”

  “Eight, now,” I pointed out.

  “Yes, it’s September, isn’t it?” he said, his voice distant. He was thinking. I had caught his attention. Good. “I can give you five minutes,” he said.

  “Thank you.” I stepped a little closer, enough so I could speak without lifting my voice. “I have been a vampire too long. I forget what it is like for you, to have such a short life in front of you, when everything is fresh and novel. I was wrong to ask you to give that up. You are entitled to live your life.”

  He did not answer at once. That was a new thing, the deliberation. It was one more way the experience of command had changed him. “If you think I took this commission to have an exciting adventure, then you do not know me at all.”

  “I know why you did it,” I assured him. “I wanted you to know why I tried to persuade you otherwise.”

  “I knew why,” he said. “I knew before I left London. Before I left the house.”

  “You do?” He had surprised me, this time.

  “This isn’t your war. None of them are your wars. You’ve outlived wars, cities, even countries. I don’t hold that against you, Nial. I don’t understand it. I would have to live as long as you to understand, I think. But I do not think less of you because of it.”

  “If that is what you believe, then you know me just as little as you think I know you.” My heart was beating on its own again. Why does speaking the truth take such courage? I had given Sebastian my complete trust, told him things no other living human knew about me. Why was I circling around this like a stammering school boy?

  “I don’t think anyone knows you completely,” Sebastian replied dryly. “There is too much to know. You never react the way I think you might. There’s always another story. Nothing that occurs in my life is a surprise to you. You’ve done it all, more than once.”

  “I’m not that cynical,” I assured him, for the picture he was drawing was unflattering.

  “Go home, Nial,” Sebastian said wearily. “You have no place here.”

  “Damn it all to hell, Sebastian!” I exploded. “I want a place here! I want a life! I want a human life once more.” I threw out my hand, toward the siege lines. “I want to belong. I want to be missed.”

  The silence grew between us, thick and full of unspoken thoughts. Sebastian was staring at me. His heart was beating harder.

  “That is what this is about?” he asked at last. “Envy?”

  I threw my hands up. “No! For heaven’s sake. I love you. I don’t want to lose you. I’ve never had to do this before – send someone off to war – and it’s killing me!”

  Finally, I had spoken the words.

  They hung between us, thickening the silence that fell.

  Sebastian finally stirred, his gaze settling on mine. “You have the most astounding talent for out-thinking men, Nial. It has left me speechless with admiration more than once. But when it comes to your own private affairs, you’re as limited as the rest of us mere mortals, aren’t you?” He gave a small smile. “You realize you might have said that in London and saved yourself a journey?”

  I raised my brow. “I speak of love and you speak of efficiency. The army has changed you more than I thought.” I kept my tone light, but my heart had slipped its leash once more and was thudding against my chest. I have lived for centuries, but at that moment, waiting for Sebastian to accept me and how I felt…I hadn’t felt so thoroughly human and vulnerable since I had been human, many hundreds of lives of men ago.

  Would Sebastian doubt me? I had made the foolish journey from London, and beggared myself before him. Would he consider that, or would he think it was a lie? We two were, after all, excellent liars.

  Sebastian stepped into the stall. Closer. “I speak of efficiency only to give myself time.”

  “Time?”

  “To absorb what you say.” He moved a little closer – close enough for the hem of the disguising cape to brush the toes of my boots. “You know how I feel. I’ve felt that way since I met you.”

  “Tell me,” I urged him.

  “Why?”

  Truth, I reminded myself. “I need to hear the words. I need that reassurance.”

  Sebastian was studying me in the dark. He could not possibly see as much as I was able to, but he appeared to see something in my face that told him more than my words.

  He reached through the mere inches that separated us and pressed his lips to mine. Ah! I had so missed him. His scent, his touch, his warmth…and his companionship. I held myself very still, afraid that if I misspoke or reacted in the wrong way, I would not only lose this moment, but I would lose Sebastian altogether. I was very unsure of myself…something that had not happened for an age or two, and my inexperience with self-doubt made it seem much worse.

  Sebastian picked up my hand. “I have loved you since we met in Southampton, and I will probably love you until the end of my days. I have never met anyone like you, Nial. Having you in my life has changed my life in so many ways I cannot count them all. How can you, with all your experience, not know this?”

  Simple happiness warmed me. “You have never told me that before. I have lived a long time, Bastian, but I have never been able to listen to a man’s thoughts.”

  He kissed me again, and this one was powerful and deep. I let my groan emerge.

  Sebastian pulled away from me. He was smiling. “You might have lived a long time, but right at this moment, you are more human than I have ever seen you.”

  “That’s because of you. You let me be human.”

  Sebastian took in a slow breath. “Now I understand what draws you to me.”

  “That you are human? If that were so, I could take my pick of any man or woman who stirs my interest. The company of humans alone does not give me what you do. You let me be myself and accept that.”

  “And that lets you be more human?” He was puzzled.

  “I am human, under this ageless flesh. I just forget, most of the time, how to be human. You remind me how, with almost everything you do and say.” I drew him toward me, until our bodies brushed against each other. “How long can you stay?” I asked.

  “I’ve already lingered for too long,” Sebastian murmured.

  I reached for the buttons on his breeches and slipped them undone. “Then we must be quick.”

  He didn’t protest as I thrust my hand inside, searching for him. His cock stirred and lengthened in my hand, and he groaned, gripping my shoulder in reaction. “This will go fast enough,” he murmured, his voice thick
with arousal.

  * * * * *

  Afterwards, while his heart settled, we sat with our backs against the wall of the stall. The smell of old, moldy hay was strong, but I didn’t care. My heart was light…and quiet. I was at peace, a profound peace of the soul I had not felt in a very long time.

  Sebastian straightened his back up from his lean against the wall. “I must go. My sergeant will start to worry if I do not return shortly.”

  “Yes, you must,” I agreed. This time, the idea of his leaving did not rouse anything but a distant regret. “You have work to do.”

  He smiled, and it was an open, pleased expression. Then he lifted himself to his feet in one smooth movement and settled the cloak around him properly. “I am glad you made the journey here,” he said, as he slid the top buttons of his shirt undone and pushed his hand inside.

  “So am I.” I reluctantly rose to face him and say goodbye.

  He tugged with his hand and I heard a small metallic snap.

  Then he held out his hand. Hanging from his fingers, dangling from the broken chain, was the Claddagh ring he had never once removed. “Here,” he said. “Take it.”

  I hesitated. I knew what the ring meant to him. It was his mother’s ring, designed by the man he suspected to be his father, and given to her as a sign of his love. “Sebastian…” I began, keeping my hands against my knees.

  “There is no one else in this world that deserves to have this more than you,” he said. “There is no one worthy of wearing it, than you. Take it, Nial. Keep it, until the day you find someone just as worthy to give it to.”

  His words were threaded with mortal thoughts. Then he, too, had faced the possibility of his death in the coming days.

  “I would prefer you give the ring to me when you’re back in London.”

  Sebastian lifted my hand, palm up, and poured the chain and the ring onto it. “I don’t want to reach the end of my life and regret not having done this,” he said. “I have never once regretted my time with you. I want you to have the ring.”

  I curled my fingers around it and stayed silent. There were no words I could use that would adequately convey the warmth and the gladness and the deep and humbling gratitude I felt.

  “English pigs!” came the hiss, with a strong French accent.

  Sebastian moved fast – his reflexes had been honed from weeks of training and experience. He spun around toward the ruined doorway of the stable, drawing one of the dueling pistols out at the same time. He flung his shooting arm out toward the Frenchman in his blue coat, who stood silhouetted in the doorway, his horse beside him. At the same time, Sebastian stepped sideways.

  To protect me.

  I know I cried out a protest, but I do not remember what I said. Both pistols fired at once. The Frenchman staggered.

  Finally, finally, I was able to move beyond the shock. I leapt upon the Frenchman. He was already dying. Sebastian had drilled him through the heart, neatly and precisely. I finished his work by tearing the man’s throat out. The stench of hot blood did not stir me in the slightest. Fury was all I felt.

  I hurried back to Sebastian. He was lying on the dirt, quite still. I turned him over onto his back. His eyes were closed. I tore the waistcoat open.

  The white shirt beneath was covered in blood. I contained my reaction, fighting for calm. I ripped the shirt apart.

  The shot had pierced his chest, between the breastbone and the heart. I was no stranger to war wounds but examining this particular wound took all my courage. The shot had ricocheted off the breastbone itself – there was a white mark where the bone had been scraped. I lifted his shoulder and felt carefully around his back. There was no corresponding wound. The shot was still inside.

  But where?

  Sebastian coughed and groaned. His eyes fluttered open. “Hurts...” he whispered.

  “What were you thinking?” I asked him, dismayed. “I could take a dozen shots and not blink.”

  He tried to speak. I saw his throat working and his lips move. Then he drew in a breath, slow and hard. The bubbling sound it made as he took in the air was a bad sign. Then blood spilled over the corner of his mouth and dribbled down to the dirt.

  “Instinct,” he whispered, his eyes drifting closed.

  I picked up his hand and squeezed it. “Bastian!”

  He tried to open his eyes. I saw the merest sliver of green. Then they shut and his head rolled to the side and his hand slid from mine.

  “You are my country,” I told him. Then I closed his eyes.

  I don’t know what happened for the next little while. Time becomes blurred and confused to me. I could reconstruct the moments by assembling my memories in the correct order, but it would mean revisiting the pain and despair and I am in no hurry to do that.

  The first coherent memory I do recall was leaning over his cooling body. I was on my knees and hunched over like an old man, rocking backward and forward as I tried to find a way to vent the explosive pressure inside me.

  Two thoughts warred in my head. I knew I could get Sebastian back. It wasn’t too late. I had turned a handful of humans before and knew it could be done.

  But then there was the promise I had made him. I could hear his voice, spelling out the terms of the promise, as if it had been only a moment ago. “I never want to become an immortal. Promise me, Nathanial.”

  Those I had turned had not thanked me. Most of them considered the life of a vampire to be a curse. So had I. It had only been the last few years when I had begun to see there were compensations, that life might possibly be sweet despite the bitterness of the long, empty years.

  Now that had been taken from me. But...I had promised.

  I waivered, caught between my promise and the vista of years ahead of me, once against bleak and lonely. Only, the loneliness I had become accustomed to before I met Sebastian now looked like the most bitter and dire straits.

  I hovered, my needs fighting my word, until the very last moments when I would still have a choice. It was Sebastian’s cooling hand in mine and the passing of vital minutes that finally tipped the balance. I simply could not bear the idea of losing him.

  So I turned him, knowing he would be like all the others – he would curse me. Perhaps, he would even hate me for a while. I pushed those possibilities to the furthest corners of my mind and worked to bring him back – not back to the life he had known, but my life. I made him a vampire.

  * * * * *

  Eden Rock Hotel, St. Barths, Caribbean. Present day.

  Nial fell silent for a moment. His gaze was out upon the sea, which was bathed a bright orange by the sinking sun. Winter knew he was reliving that moment in the ruined stable, over and over again.

  How many times had he second-guessed his decision?

  Sebastian was sitting on the sofa now, his arms on his knees, staring at the floor. He didn’t seem to enjoy the memory much, either.

  “Of course, Sebastian hated me, when he woke to his new life and realized what I had done,” Nial said.

  “No!” Winter breathed, shocked. She looked at Sebastian accusingly. “How could you? You know why he did it!”

  Sebastian looked up at her. His expression was strained. “I didn’t know,” he said.

  This time, it was Nial who drew in the sharp breath. “But...you came back, barely a month after you left.”

  Sebastian nodded. “I couldn’t stay away. Not for long. I was lost without you.”

  “But...” Winter began, puzzled. Her heart was racing. How could they not know? How could they fail to see the truth shouting from the other’s actions?

  Sebastian got to his feet, moving slowly toward Nial. “You said you are my country.”

  Nial dropped his gaze to his hands where they curled over the arm of the chair. “Yes.” He seemed to say it reluctantly.

  Sebastian dropped to his knees in front of him. “I didn’t hear that. I think...I must have died before you said it.” He rested a hand on Nial’s knee. “It changes everything. It expl
ains...everything. Why you wouldn’t fight. Why you found me in Dunkirk.”

  Nial met his gaze. “It isn’t true anymore.”

  Winter caught her breath.

  Sebastian pulled away from him, shocked.

  Nial held his hand out toward Winter. His eyes seemed very blue in the failing light. She took his hand, feeling the strength in his fingers as he drew her toward his chair. He sat her on the broad arm and curled his arm around her waist. Then he picked up Sebastian’s hand and held it. “This...us...we are my country now.”

  Winter rested her head against Nial’s shoulder and picked up Sebastian’s other hand.

  Sebastian looked from her to Nial, a small smile tugging at his lips. “Yes,” he agreed. “Mine, too.”

  Winter sighed. “And mine.”

  The sun slipped below the horizon and the light faded, leaving them in peace.

  More in the Blood Stone Series

  .

  Blood Stone – Book 2 of the Blood Stone Series

  Survival becomes a deadly game where lovers might be enemies.

  Nial orders Calum Garrett to get close to Hollywood producer Kate Lindenstream. Garrett reluctantly complies for he has held himself apart from humans for centuries. Kate doesn’t fall into Garrett’s arms, either. She already has someone for that. Roman Xerus -- whom Kate knows as Adrian -- and Garrett go way back to the sixteenth century Scottish highlands, but they parted bitterly two hundred years ago.

  With Roman’s support, Kate battles Garrett in wills and business as he methodically forces himself into her life. However, on the closed-in movie set in the Californian desert, Garrett’s calm, orderly world crumbles for Garrett is drawn to Kate. He has begins to experience real, human feelings.

  Kate doesn’t cooperate in the chess game Nial orchestrates, despite being unaware of the strategies swirling around her film set. Demanding and expecting only the best for her movie, Kate’s agenda forces Roman and Garrett to work together to protect her and keep the humans around her ignorant of the Pro Libertatus, the anonymous and all-powerful vampire group who nearly killed Nial, Sebastian and Winter, and shield Kate from the excesses of the League for Humanity. But could Roman really be with the Pro Libertatus?