The Traveler came to his feet as if by magic, just suddenly standing. "I don't think we could be more astonished if Anita had conjured a dragon from thin air. She has tamed our Asher and paid no blood for it." He glided to the open floor space. "Yvette is not so easily sated." He smiled at her as she rose to her feet. "Are you, my dear?"
She ran her hands through Jason's hair as she glided past. He jumped as if she'd stung him, which amused the hell out of her. She was still laughing when she turned with a swoosh of white skirts and held her arms out to him. "Come to me, Jason."
He huddled in on himself, curling into a little ball of arms and elbows and knees. He just shook his head.
"You are my choice, my special one," Yvette said. "You are not strong enough to refuse me."
An awful thought occurred to me. I was willing to bet that Jean-Claude hadn't covered rotting on people as a no-no. Jason might not recover from another embrace from the messily dead. I leaned into Jean-Claude and asked, "You did cover torture, no outright torture, right?"
"Of course," he said.
I stood. "You can feed on him, but you can't rot on him."
She turned cool eyes to me. "You have no say in this."
"Jean-Claude negotiated for no torture. Rotting on Jason while you feed is torture to him. You know that. It's why you want him."
"I want my bit of werewolf blood, and I want it exactly the way I like it best," she said.
Richard said, "You can feed off of me."
"You don't know what you're offering, Richard," I said.
"I know that Jason is mine to protect, and he can't endure this." He got to his feet, splendid in his new tux.
"Has Jason told you what happened to him in Branson?" I asked. Jason had been having a forced tryst with two female vamps when they began to rot. They turned into long-dead corpses while he was still lying na**d with them. It was his worse nightmare, almost a phobia now. I'd witnessed the event, even had those dead hands on my body when I waded in to to rescue him. I couldn't blame him for being terrified.
"Jason told me," Richard said.
"Hearing about it isn't the same thing as being there, Richard."
Jason had hidden his face against his knees. He was saying something low. I had to kneel to hear it. He was saying, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," over and over and over. I touched his arm, and he screamed, eyes wide, mouth open in astonishment.
"It's okay, Jason. It's okay." Richard was right. Jason couldn't do this.
I nodded. "You're right, Richard."
"No," Padma said. "No, the Wolf King is mine. I will not share him."
"I will take nothing less than a shapeshifter," Yvette said.
Jamil stood.
Richard said, "No, it's my job to protect Jason, not yours, Jamil."
"It's my job to protect you, Ulfric."
Richard shook his head and started undoing the black bow tie. He undid the top few buttons on the pleated shirt, baring the strong, perfect line of his neck.
"No," Yvette said. She stamped her foot, hands on hips. "He is not afraid. I want someone who's afraid."
In my head I thought, he will be afraid. He'll be very afraid. Notice I wasn't jumping up and offering myself in Jason's place. I'd seen this particular show. I had no desire to star in it.
"And I have my own plans for the Ulfric," Padma said.
The Traveler tsked at them like naughty children. "It is a fair offer, Yvette. The Ulfric himself for one of his lesser wolves."
"It is not the potency of the blood I want. It is the terror."