Mirceo's lips thinned. "I didn't take you for such an ascetic."
"All things being equal, I enjoy comforts. But Poly affords few of them."
"You must've really wanted to stay away. From me."
"Not everything is about you, leechling." But wasn't that a huge part of it?
"Then tell me what was this penance was about."
"I wanted to get stronger and seek my fortunes." Before he'd left Abaddon, he'd vowed to Bettina: I will do anything--anything--so that I may never know defeat like that again. "I promised myself I would stay until I'd accumulated a certain amount of wealth and kills. Those goals took me five centuries to achieve."
Glancing to the right of Cas, Mirceo asked, "Did you think of me?"
Some minutes less than others. "Perhaps on occasion." Cas hadn't comprehended how much he would crave the simple companionship of their relationship until he'd lost it. Always, he'd missed his best friend.
But at night, alone in this cave, he'd found his thoughts turning . . . darker.
Aside from masturbating to the memory of their kiss, he'd conjured up filthy fantasies about Mirceo. Cas would stroke himself to a bone-melting release, yelling with equal parts pleasure and frustration.
He recalled the last one he'd indulged in here.
Cas unlacing his breeches and ordering Mirceo to suck . . . the prince's gray eyes dancing as he dropped to his knees . . . using the vampire's hot mouth . . . giving Mirceo his cum . . . the vampire taking his due and biting Cas's cock. . . .
That fantasy had made him culminate so hard his back had bowed.
Cas tugged his coat down to conceal his raging hard-on. Gods almighty. Filthy.
"Only on occasion, demon?" Mirceo's words ripped Cas from his memories. "At least one of us can lie. I'll bet you thought of me and fondled your mouthwatering member on these very furs." Mirceo skimmed his fingers through the top one, his pale vampire skin stark against silken black.
Mercy. Those deft fingers had encircled Cas's shaft mere nights ago, forcing it against Mirceo's own. That semen-slicked clutch . . .
"How long will you deny I'm yours?" Mirceo asked. "You saw your pre-cum. You know it's for me."
"And why would I produce pre-cum? I can't impregnate you."
Irritation flashed in the vampire's expression. "Is spawning all sex is good for? Because that was the last thing you were thinking about when you tagged every available female across the worlds. Besides, you're to give me seed because it will bond us. Just as sharing blood does."
The more Cas struggled not to imagine coming inside Mirceo, the more vivid the image grew. Frustration simmered. "So I should accept having no offspring without even a qualm?"
"You can't impregnate anyone until you break your seal, and you can't do that without me. In any case, I've found a way for us to have children, even with me as your mate. But you'll probably be too stubborn to listen."
"Tell me how that would be possible."
"We would use a donated egg for you--or us--to fertilize. Mina said she'd happily carry a babe for us."
"So not only would she be trapped down there in Dacia, she'd be trapped and pregnant."
He stiffened. "She's not trapped."
"Uh-huh. You can't keep her shut away forever."
Mirceo's eyes flickered black with emotion. "Watch me. I will lock her in Dacia's dungeon before she ever leaves the protection of the realm."
Cas raised his brows.
Mirceo released a breath. "It's a sore subject. Lothaire has been hinting around about sending her into the otherlands for education. If she stayed in her mist, she should be safe from the plague, but so many things could go wrong. If she lost concentration or grew too exhausted . . . or if Forbearers somehow found her . . ." He looked as if he were imagining every worst-case scenario. At length, he said, "I'll take Lothaire's godsdamned head before he sends her away."
All the best with that, you rash young leechling. Lothaire was rumored to be one of the longest-lived vampires in existence--which meant he would be diabolically powerful.
Canting his head, Mirceo said, "You feel protective of Mina already, don't you?" I . . . do. "You can scorn me all you want, but you are her brother-by-fate now. And she's thrilled to be your sister. Your family just got bigger."
"Silver-tongued as ever," Cas said in an indifferent tone, but the vampire had gotten him thinking. "Where would the egg come from?"
"Balery, my uncle's concoctioness and oracle, has some."
"You expect me to trust a seeress--who serves the Enemy of Old--to engineer a pup of mine?"
"Yes. Because I trust her."
"And would you be my partner in parenting?" Cas scoffed. "May the gods help any younglings with you as a father."
"Staked through the heart, demon." All light left Mirceo's eyes, and Cas wanted it back. "No one has ever wounded me like you do."
Mirceo had always struck him as unflappable, his emotions bulletproof. Did the vampire's uncaring facade hide a more sensitive self?
"Before I met you, I never thought about bringing children into the worlds," Mirceo said, holding Cas's gaze, "but the idea of creating something with you, then protecting it, appeals deeply to me. It would be a worthwhile endeavor, no? A fulfilling one?"
The vampire's words surprised him. What if Mirceo could somehow stay true and committed to a shared future?
"How long would that occupy you before you grew bored? I saw you burn through scores of partners. You simply aren't capable of eternity, and I'd accept nothing less from my mate."
"You've a lot of nerve to call me out on the number of partners. The notches on your belt must be infinite."
"Yes, but I made sure my bedmates weren't looking for more. Not usually a problem, since I was an impoverished demon of zero import. But with a rich prince like you, well, people start to dream. Every soul you've bedded ached for more of you, but you would cast them that look--"
"What look?"
"The it's-been-swell look. The one that said you wanted nothing more to do with them." Cas could see himself among that number, ruined forever by the vampire's incomparable sex appeal. What if I start to dream? "Your eye was always on the next conquest."
"Just as you've changed, so have I." Mirceo sounded confident. "I am ready for this. Only your stubbornness holds us back."
"You're the youngest mated male I've heard of in all my years. But finding your mate early is not a good thing. There's a reason most immortals go centuries before facing that kind of commitment--because they are in no way prepared to handle it when young."
"Damn you, demon, I don't want others!" Mirceo's elegant fingers gripped the furs--another visual to torment Cas for eons. "I don't desire or need them." The vampire couldn't lie, so he'd meant what he said. For now. In the future, the prince's outlook would change. "We could grow the House of Castellan together."
"I listened to you about journeying to Dacia, because you'd all but beguiled me by that point. Now I wonder what in the hell I'd been thinking. Would I--the spawn of a nameless death demon, with no ancestral line to speak of--be welcome inside those hallowed Dacian halls? If you actually believe that, you're kidding yourself." Just one more reason the two of them would never work. Cas rose and paced, restless in the suddenly too-small cave.
Brows drawn, Mirceo watched him. "I am trying, Caspion. I want only to be what you need."
"You can't force these things. Sometimes you have to let things just . . . be."
"Easier said . . ."
He needed Mirceo to listen to him. "Here, in the grueling downtime between hunts, I would will time to pass faster." He'd lain on those furs, memorizing every nuance of the cave ceiling, his mind turning. Hell, Cas had welcomed the surprise whenever a stray Wendigo wandered past the flap. "No endeavor in the worlds could madden a demon so much as that. I finally learned to let go. I simply had to take the pain and accept my lot."
"I'll never accept a life without you in it," Mirceo said. "You're denying us for reasons
that no longer apply. Why? Perhaps you don't lack faith in me. Perhaps you lack faith in you."
"What does that mean?"
"Chew it over. We'll discuss it after we collect our impossible bounty." Mirceo removed his sword belt and his trench coat, tossing them atop a trunk.
Cas cleared his throat. "What are you doing?"
"Settling in for the duration." He reclined on the furs, hands behind his head.
The vampire in my bed. Desire was a whip across Cas's back.
"If only we had something to do to kill time." Mirceo's voice was lazy, seductive. That sexual tension sizzled between them. "I could use a top-off, and you look like you're about to burst."
"Because you're turning me into a host!" Cas could bloodlet, but that would help for only so long. Whenever a host lost blood, his body assumed he was ceding it to a vampire, so it would produce an excess.
And right now, Cas's excess had settled into his groin--away from his brain. How was he going to concentrate on the job like this? He needed to drain himself of blood--and pressure.
Holding Cas's gaze, Mirceo murmured, "Won't you feed me, Caspion? I'll make it good for you."
Finally Mirceo had asked. Who could deny this prince? "Fine. You'll have your dinner from me. But we'll do it my way." Mirceo had manipulated Cas; why not use the vampire to make one of his countless fantasies come true?
Expression brightening, Mirceo traced to stand before him. "What did you have in mind?"
"I'm going to show you what I'd expect from my mate." Reclaim control. Dominate the prince. "And, leechling . . . you are not going to like it."
SEVENTEEN
Caspion eased ever closer. His swollen horns were straightened, his eyes gone black. Even his fangs had lengthened. So wickedly demonic. "I'm going to own you for a time. Because that is what I do to my partners." At Mirceo's ear, he rasped, "I'm going to own you because you're a prince, and I think a part of me hates you for that. A part of me needs to put you on your knees."