“Think you can?” He slouched into a chair with his whiskey. “I’d wager you on that, but you wouldn’t be able to pay up, being a pile of ash at the end of it.”

“I’ve seen the end of it, in the smoke.” She came to him, leaning over the chair—so real he could almost smell her. “This world will burn. I’ll have no need of it. Every human on this foolish island will be slaughtered, screaming and drowning in their own blood. Your brother and his circle will die most horribly. I have seen it.”

“Your wizard would hardly show you otherwise,” Cian said with a shrug. “Were you always so gullible?”

“He shows me truth!” She shoved away, her gown sweeping in a furious arch. “Why do you persist in this doomed adventure? Why do you oppose the one who gave you the greatest gift? I came here to offer you a truce—a private and personal agreement, just between you and me. Step away from this, my darling, and you have my pardon. Step away and come to me, and you have not only my pardon but a place at my side come the day. Everything you hunger for and have denied yourself I’ll lay at your feet—in repentance for abandoning you when you needed me.”

“So, I just go back to my time, my world, and all’s forgiven?”

“I give you my word on it. But I’ll give you much, much more if you come to me. To me.” She purred it, molding her br**sts with her hands. “Remember what we shared that night? The spark, the heat of it?”

He watched her run her hands over her body, white against red. “I remember, very well.”

“We can have that again, and more. You’ll be a prince in my court. And a general, leading armies instead of slogging through the muck with humans. You’ll have your pick of worlds and all their pleasures. An eternity of desires met.”

“I remember you promising something along those lines before. Then I was alone, broken and lost, with the graveyard dirt barely washed off me.”

“And so this is my penance. Come now, come. You have no place here, Cian. You belong with your own kind.”

“Interesting.” He tapped his fingers on the side of his cup. “So, all I need do is take your word that you’ll reward me rather than torturing and ending me.”

“Why would I destroy my own creation?” she replied in reasonable tones. “And one who’s proven himself to be a strong warrior?”

“For spite, of course, and because your word is as much an illusion as your appearance here. But I’ll give you mine on one vital matter, Lilith, and my word is as hard and as bright as those diamonds you’re wearing. It will be I who comes for you. It will be I who does for you.”

He picked up a knife and slashed it over his own palm. “I swear it to you, in blood. Mine will be the last face you see.”

Fury tightened her face. “You’ve damned yourself.”

“No,” he murmured when her image vanished. “You damned me.”

It was deep night, and he was done with sleep.

At least at such an hour he could wander where he liked without bumping into servants or courtiers or guards. He’d had enough of company—human and vampire. Still he needed distraction, movement, something to clear away the bitter dregs of the dream, and the visitation that followed it.

He admired the architecture of the castle—something a few steps up, and over into fantasy than what would have been usual when he was alive. It was storybook, inside and out, he mused, with the shifting lights of torches rising from their dragon sconces, the tapestries of faeries and festivals, the polished, jewel-toned marble.

Of course, it hadn’t been built as a fortress, but more as a lavish home. Fit, most certainly, for a queen. Until Lilith, Geall had existed in peace and so could focus its energies and intellects on art and culture.

He could, in the quiet and dark, take time to study and admire the art—the paintings and tapestries, the murals and carvings. He could drift through the dark with the perfume of hothouse flowers sweetening the air or wander to the library to peruse the tall shelves.

Since its creation, Geall had been a land for art and books and music rather than warfare and weaponry. How apt, how cold, that both gods and demons should select such a place for bloody war.

The library, as Moira had indicated when falling in love with his own, was a quiet cathedral of books. He’d passed some of his time with a few of them already, and had been both interested and entertained that the stories he’d found there weren’t so different from ones written in his own lifetime.

Would Geall, if it survived, produce its own Shakespeare, Yeats, Austen? Would its art go through revivals and renaissance and offer its version of Monet or Degas?

A fascinating thought.

For now, he was too restless, too edgy to settle himself down with a book, and instead moved on. There were rooms he’d yet to explore, and by night he could go wherever he wanted.

As he walked through shadows, the rain drummed steadily.

He moved through what he supposed had been a kind of formal drawing room and was now serving as an armory. He lifted a sword, testing its weight, its balance, its edge. Geall’s craftsmen might have devoted their time, previously, to arts, but they knew how to forge a sword.

Time would tell if it would be enough.

Without aim, he turned and stepped into what he saw was a music room.

A gilded harp stood elegantly in one corner. A smaller cousin, shaped just as a traditional Irish harp, graced a stand nearby. There was a monochord—an early forefather of the piano—enhanced with lovely carving on its soundbox.

He plucked its string idly, pleased its sound was true and clear.

There was a hurdy-gurdy, and when he turned its shaft, slid the bow over its strings, it sang with the mournful music of bagpipes.

There were lutes and pipes, all beautifully crafted. There was comfortable seating, and a pretty hearth from the local marble. A fine room, he mused, for musicians and those who appreciated the art.

Then he saw the vielle. He lifted it. It’s body was longer than the violin that would come from it, and it held five strings. When the instruments had been popular, he’d had no interest in such matters. No, he’d been for killing whores in alleyways.

But when a man has eternity, he needs hobbies and pursuits, and years to study them.

He sat with the vielle over his lap, and began to play.

It came back to him, the notes, the sounds, and calmed him as it was said music could do. With the rain as his accompaniment, he let himself fall into the music, drifted away on the tears of it.