Blood Trial Supernatural Battle (Vampire Towers #1) - Kelly St. Clare Page 0,55
to him with sir, not Kyros.
“Angelica?” I asked her softly in the hopes two thousand other vampires in the tower wouldn’t hear. “How long will he keep me here?”
The corners of her mouth turned down, her expression grim. “You’ll return to work the day after next. Once the effects of the thrall fade.”
Return to work. Escaping from there would be easier.
“Will I get my phone back then?” I asked.
“You will. I told your friend that you went camping with work colleagues for a long weekend.”
Tell me she didn’t. Tommy would be fucking frantic. Me? Go camping?
I swallowed back dread over that tidbit. “The thrall doesn’t affect me unless Kyros is too close, right? I’ll be okay with my phone now.”
I had to do damage control ASAP.
We returned to the elevator and she pushed the call button.
“Miss Tetley, you just sang to a television with a bottle of shampoo in your hand for three hours straight. Females experience the aftermath in a different way to males—often symptoms mimic those we experience during PMS.”
She had to be screwing with me.
Her earnest expression didn’t fade, and I considered her words. I didn’t get bad PMS, if truth was told. Tommy said I was always a moody bitch and that didn’t worsen during my period.
“And males?” I asked, wondering if asking for my phone a second time would make her suspicious.
“Protectiveness, as you have seen. Violence, if another male draws too close. Extreme lust. He won’t think of anything else but you for the full seventy-two hours of the thrall.”
I lifted my brows. “I see.”
Angelica had used the word protective. I knew of another P word that could describe Kyros.
Possessive.
But I was haunting his every waking moment, which was good to know. Except that fucker wasn’t allowed to fantasize about my body.
She slid a look at me. “Kyros emptied your level and sent all male Vissimo to rooms on the first ten floors. Some are sleeping five to a room for the duration of the thrall.”
Ding!
We entered the lift again and my heart pounded as she jabbed Level 66. The top floor.
“You said that existing on the brink of death explained most things about your kind.” I ventured. “How do you explain the compulsion thing?”
“Very good,” she murmured. “That is what the clan researching our origins centre their research on. It is considered the anomaly in our make-up. There are those of us who liken compulsion to human hypnotists, a skill heightening by the constant adrenaline coursing through our bodies. Others say that because blood is our life force, we have greater control over it.”
Humans needed oxygen, food, and water to live and we had no magical command over them.
She spoke again. “My personal thought is that Vissimo simply evolved that way. Snakes have venom, birds have flight, some animals can change the colour of their skin to camouflage with their surroundings. Each of those qualities is magical, really—a physiological change which enables them to survive. In my mind, our compulsion is an extension of that concept; we evolved in such a way to protect ourselves or to secure a meal.”
Sure, a massive fucking extension.
Though I would no sooner compare humans to a shark, so perhaps I shouldn’t compare humans and Vissimo—no matter that we looked similar.
“Why do you guys have a cafeteria when you drink blood?” Oh my god, did they serve blood down there? Was that even wine I saw?
Angelica laughed at my expression. “Brink of death, remember? We have large appetites. However, we cannot survive without blood donors. How much depends on the age of the Vissimo.”
Ding!
I stared between the doors as they slid apart and gaped at the multitude of blurring vampires on Level 66.
“Are you ready to learn about the cause of Clan Sundulus?” Angelica asked. She stepped out of the lift and turned with a grace I’d never possess.
Her head tilted as I lingered in the elevator.
There was a challenge in her eyes. Something I’d never seen in her expression. Then again, I had a feeling a lot of people underestimated this woman. She was one of those quiet people who somehow always got what they wanted.
The question was: What did she want?
The last time I entered an area filled to the brink with vampires, I’d nearly pissed my panties. Seeing vampire Kyros in his full glory might have put the weaker vampire into perspective, yet I knew the coming moments were about to be very uncomfortable.
Did I need to know what happened on Level 66 to escape?