Inevitably Yves (Immortal Assassins

Book 6) Mia Monroe

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INEVITABLY YVES
Immortal Assassins
Book 6

MIA MONROE
Copyright © 2024 by Mia Monroe
All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written
permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

This is a work of fiction. Unless otherwise indicated, all the names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents in this book are either the product of the author's
imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Cover Design by: Wicked By Design
Photography by: Xram Ragde
Editing by: Kate Wood
Proofread by: Charity VanHuss

This book and all elements are 100% human created.

 Content Warnings

This book features a team of vampire assassins who take out really bad people. There is on page violence including vampires
being vampires and bad guys doing bad things.

SA/Trafficking discussions but nothing happens on page or is graphically discussed.

Decadent use of blood
Vampire violence- more than usual

The relationship between MCs is low angst and the book has an HEA.
 Contents

Prologue
1. Yves (Cillian)
2. Yves
3. Damiano
4. Yves
5. Damiano
6. Yves
7. Damiano
8. Yves
9. Damiano
10. Yves
11. Damiano
12. Yves
13. Damiano
14. Damiano
15. Yves
16. Damiano
17. Yves
18. Damiano
19. Yves
20. Damiano
21. Yves
22. Damiano
23. Yves
24. Yves
25. Damiano
26. Yves
27. Damiano
28. Yves
29. Damiano
Epilogue
A Note From Mia
About the Author
Also by Mia Monroe
 Prologue

Ireland, 1350

Rain pours down on the villagers filing into the church, each muttering greetings to me as they pass. I enjoy standing out front to
welcome my flock, but today is particularly dreary. It is meant to be a somber day anyway. Maundy Thursday, the holy day in
reverence of the last supper. It has been a long Lenten season, but here we are, on the brink of celebration. Resurrection is upon
us.
After the last person enters the church, I enter too, waiting as the altar boys close the church doors behind me. We start the
procession to the front, Mass begins, and as the morning hymns and readings take place, my gaze falls on a new face in the
crowd.
A man, one I am quite certain I have never seen before, gazes back at me as though we are the only two in the room. His
piercing blue-green eyes seem to glow, as if they were made of gemstones and fire. His face is perfection, every detail in
perfect harmony to create features the angels themselves would envy. Jet-black hair and a sharp Roman nose round out his face.
His hungry gaze stirs a dormant part of me. A part I’ve gone to great lengths to bury, including by joining the clergy. Ah,
how fitting to be faced with temptation on this holy day. My faith will get me through it. God be with me.
As I stand to deliver the homily, I find it difficult to ignore him. It’s as if there’s an ocean current beneath me, drawing me
ever closer to the silent stranger.
Based on his clothing, he must be a traveler. Fine silks and luxurious fabrics lead me to believe he is important. Perhaps he
is from Rome, come to check in on the lower class in Ireland.
“Father Cillian?”
The whisper draws my attention to the red-faced altar boy holding the tray of wine and bread for me. Apparently my
thoughts had drifted.
I smile and nod, remaining calm as I continue the Mass, but it is not long before my thoughts return to the man watching my
every move from the third row.
Lifting the bread from the tray, I hold it above my head and deliver the blessing. “Take and eat. This is My Body, which is
broken for you for the remission of sins.” I lift the goblet of wine next. “Drink of it, all of you. This is My Blood of the New
Testament, which is shed for you and for many, for the remission of sins.”
As the congregation files from their pews and lines up for the Eucharist, my attention remains on the handsome stranger. He
joins the line, and when he is before me, my breath hitches. He opens his mouth, extending his tongue, his eyes searching mine.
I place the piece of bread on his tongue, saying, “Corpus Domini Nostri Iesu Christi custodiat animam tuam in vitam
aeternam.”
The man chews the small piece of bread. “Amen,” he says. His accented voice, definitely Roman, vibrates through me like
lightning.
I lift the wine goblet, holding it to his full lips. “Sanguis Cristi.”
The man quirks an eyebrow at me before sipping the wine. He drags his tongue along his bottom lip, as if savoring the
taste, before nodding and moving back to his seat. After clearing my throat, I continue with Mass, slightly off balance.
 Temptation is strong, but I am stronger.
My heart lifts as Mass comes to an end. My desire for the enigmatic man to leave is strong. Once he is gone, I will pray for
continued fortitude should he happen to return.
“Do not forget, children, I will be available to hear your confessions through this evening. Go forth in peace.”
The church empties out, but my work is far from done. Standing out front, I mingle with the congregation, smiling under the
sun that has pushed its way through the clouds. After an hour, I return to my humble rectory, peeling out of my robe and
replacing it with a cassock.
I busy myself cleaning up the church for a few hours before heading out into the village. Almost everyone attends Mass in
our small community, but some are too sick or frail, so it is a pleasure for me to visit and deliver the sacrament to them at their
bedside.
Several hours later, it is time to return to the church for the reconciliation sacrament—the most draining part of my duty. In
the confessional, I listen intently to the sins of my flock, both small and large, delivering grace in the form of Our Fathers and
Hail Marys.
The confessional door opens, and the air tangibly shifts. The latticed screen that separates me from my parishioner slides
and my eyelids flutter in some strange response.
“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. I will sin again before the sun rises.”
It is him. A shiver of lust mixed with foreboding runs down my spine. My heart speeds up, my mouth goes dry.
“Are you not going to ask me what I have done, Father? What I plan to do still?”
“I-I am listening, my child.”
“I will lead a faithful sheep to the slaughter,” he says. “I will defile one of god’s own.”
“What?”
“Let me see your face,” he whispers. “It will make it so much easier to speak my transgressions.”
I sit forward slightly, turning to peer at him through the screen. Even in the dim candlelight, his face is as clear as day.
“There you are, Father,” the man says. “I heard about you on my travels. In the village of Ballygawley there is a priest, they
said. A most kind man.”
“Thank you.”
“So I came to see you for myself. You see, I am in need of a flock myself.”
“You…” I shake my head at his confusing words. “You are a priest?”
The man chuckles. “Far from it.”
“I am afraid I do not understand. Do you have a confession to make?”
“I do, Father. I have lain with men. I have fornicated in the flesh, and I will do it again. I love it.”
His words unravel the tightness in the pit of my stomach, but I must keep my defenses up.
“Why does your god so despise pleasure?” he asks. “Why should I ask for forgiveness for indulging in his creations? Can
you help me understand, Father?”
I open my mouth to speak, but the words will not come. The man smiles at me, his head tilted innocently, but this is no
normal man. He is temptation in the flesh. Something evil lurks just beneath his surface.
“Perhaps you understand my plight, Father? Certainly a man of the cloth must know all about temptation. How do you deny
yourself?”
“Prayer,” I manage to answer. “My faith guides me, as it can for you.”
“Ah, but you did not answer the primary concern. Why does your god deny us pleasure?”
“My God? Do you not believe?”
“I believe in a lot of things, Father. A man in the sky delivering earthly and spiritual punishment is not one of them.”
“But…you partook of communion. That is a sacrament. You are here to confess. I do not understand.”
The man chuckles and then he is gone in a flash. I peer through the screen to find the other side empty, but when I lean back
he is behind me. I startle.
“Sir, you cannot be in here.”
He hovers over me, nearly pressed against me in the smaller space. I stand and back as far away as possible, but there is
nowhere to run.
“Father Cillian,” the man says, reaching out to touch my cheek. “You are indeed all that they said. Kind, welcoming, and so
very handsome. Yet, you give your life to service for a non-existent deity. I could give you so much more.”
“Please, sir. It is fine if you do not believe, but I must ask you to step back.”
He holds my gaze as his hand slides from my cheek to my neck. He tugs on my collar and my breath hitches. “What a pretty
neck you have. How old are you, Father?”
“Twenty-six.”
“Twenty-six. Just a baby.” His hand moves to my chest over my heart. “What if I told you that I know what you keep in
here?” He taps my chest with his finger. “I know all of it, even the things you do not dare whisper to your god.”
 “Who are you?”
“I am your savior, Cillian. I can give you everything you seek.”
“I seek nothing. My life is the Church and I am fulfilled.”
He chuckles, moving backward out of the confessional. I take a moment to breathe and compose myself, all too aware of
my body’s carnal reaction to his presence. I will not let this seductive stranger lead me to my destruction.
I exit the confessional, searching the church with my gaze for the man. He is gone. Thank God.
Approaching the altar, I try to push the images out of my mind. The allure of a male body, especially one as intriguing as
his, threatens to disrupt my composure. I fall to my knees to pray for strength.
With my forehead pressed to the stone, I whisper a prayer for release of my scandalous thoughts, but a hand on my shoulder
startles me.
“You did not think I would leave without my prize, did you?”
“Sir, please. I am not a plaything.”
I do not see him move, but suddenly he appears in front of me. “Oh, Father. Father, Father. I do admire your conviction. I
imagine this is how you keep your flock so steady.” He drags his fingers under my chin. “You are stunning, Cillian. The most
beautiful man I have ever seen. You should know, I came here for you. I came to liberate you from a world that cannot see your
gifts the way I can.”
His words make no sense. “I do not need liberation. I am happy here.”
He chuckles darkly, pushing my knees apart to settle between them. It is entirely scandalous but I can’t find it in me to resist
his touch.
“I want you, and I will not accept anything else.” His hand moves under my cassock, resting between my legs.
The action shakes me out of my stupor, and I push away from him, scrambling across the stone floor. He stalks me easily,
pursuing me until my back is pressed against the base of the cross.
“Ah, Cillian. I should have known you would make me chase, but that is fine. I love a good hunt.” He drops to his knees in
front of me. “Hear me out, Father. Listen to what you could have with me.”
“This is blasphemy. I will not go with you.”
He appears unfazed by my objection, crawling to meet me where I am. There is no exit unless I can somehow get away
from him.
“Your sweet, mortal, faithful mind cannot comprehend what I am and what I offer, but before the sun rises, you will.”
“You should leave, sir.”
“Sir. So formal. We are going to be such good friends. Call me by my name. Hadrian. Say it, Father.”
“Ha-Hadrian.”
The man’s breath hitches as he smiles. “Yes, that is lovely in your soft, reverent voice. Tell me, Father, does your passion
for sharing the good news with your flock extend to your bed?”
“Please…”
Hadrian cups my chin. “Or do you not even know? Have you locked your carnal passion away?”
I twist my face away, but he holds me in place. “This is not appropriate.”
“You will find that I am not interested in that. I make my own rules. Would you not like that, Cillian? To exist with nothing
but your own desires guiding you? Would you not like to know what my kiss tastes like?”
I close my eyes. “No,” I lie with as much conviction as possible. “You have come to tempt my faith. A demon from hell to
lead me away from the light. I will not let you.”
I push off his chest, somehow managing to get away and run for the door, but he is in front of me, that devious but oh-so-
enticing smile on his lips.
“You will leave when I say you can leave, Cillian.”
“No!” I duck around him, but before I can get to the door, Hadrian is there again, blocking my exit. “Are you going to harm
me?” I ask, backing away.
“Harm? No, darling. I would never harm you. Have you not been listening? I want to make you my companion.”
I scoff at that. “I cannot go with you. I am a priest. I have duties.”
“And I am here to release you from this…” He waves his hands around at the church, “This pious prison you have put
yourself in. You think I do not know why you joined the priesthood? You think your secrets hide from me?”
How…? I dart around him and hurry back to the altar, but Hadrian is right on my heels, knocking heavy wooden pews out
of his way as if they weigh nothing. Fear spurs me on, but he catches me around the waist. He turns me, pressing our chests
together.
“Hadrian, I beg you to let me go.”
“That is not what you really want. You want me to release you. I know you do.”
“No.” I shake my head, struggling to pull away, but his hold on me is powerful. “I am in service to my congregation. To
God.”
 “Why though, Cillian? Tell me the truth in your heart. Make me believe that you do not want what I can give you and I will
leave you.”
“Why is this happening? What have I done to deserve such torment?”
“You are not seeing it clearly yet. I did not come to torment you, beautiful man.” Hadrian leans in, pressing his nose to my
neck. “Oh, your scent is intoxicating. I felt its power over me as soon as I entered the village.”
I freeze as his free hand travels down my chest, settling between my legs, massaging my cock. “Tell me again, Father, how
you do not want me? Your words say one thing, but your body does not lie.”
“How do you know?”
“I know everything about you, Cillian. I know your desires, and I…” He licks my cheek. “I alone can give them to you. I
can give you the eternal life you devote yourself to. I can free your soul, absolve you of your perceived sins, and cleanse you in
the blood.”
As his lips part, sharp white fangs appear. His eyes glow like candles. “Demon,” I whisper.
“No, Father. I am no demon. I am something far greater. Beyond your wildest imagination.”
“Let me go.”
“Tell me you do not want me. Tell me with conviction.”
I open my mouth to deny him, but I cannot. I do want him, desperately, but I am sure he has somehow poisoned my mind. He
is a sorcerer.
“Tell me, Cillian.” Hadrian unbuttons my cassock, and I let him, unable, or perhaps unwilling, to fight him off. Beneath it is
my linen robe, and beneath that, nothing. He finally steps back enough to gaze at me, licking his lips.
I should run, but I seem to be frozen in place. I like his hungry gaze on me, seeing me in ways no other man has before.
“Take your robe off, Cillian. Let me see all that you are.”
With trembling hands, I pull my robe over my head, clutching it as my body is revealed to the mysterious man with the
powerful hold over me.
“Perhaps your god does exist,” Hadrian says. “For certainly, yours is no ordinary beauty.” He circles me, his breath fanning
across my bare flesh. “Only a deity could create such perfection.”
I shiver, but I know it is desire, not fear. “This is so wrong.”
“No, Cillian. We are so right.”
I step back, and he follows me until I am once again at the altar under the cross.
“Tonight, I will take of the flesh and you will drink of the blood, and by morning, you will have all the desires you have
locked away in your heart.”
I watch in stunned silence as Hadrian removes his clothing. It is not lost on me how deeply wrong this is, standing at the
altar of a holy space on the verge of sinning, but what he said of me is true.
I desire him.
Enough to break my vows.
Hadrian hooks his hand behind my neck, pulling me closer until our lips touch. It is not a kiss, more a promise of one, as he
whispers, “Beautiful Cillian. I covet your devotion. Give your life to me and I will renew you. Just say yes.”
I pull my head back enough to search his eyes. I cannot explain what is happening right now, whether Hadrian is an angel or
the devil himself, but as my body thrums against his, my cock throbbing heavily with need, I lick my lips and nod, giving myself
over to this mysterious man.
“Yes,” I whisper.
“Yes?” Hadrian repeats. “You will be my companion? You accept my gift?”
Trembling now, I nod. “I accept.”
His lips part, revealing those unworldly fangs. I do not know what I have accepted, not truly, but I am not afraid.
Hadrian sinks his teeth into my neck, and I gasp, falling limp in his arms. He guides us to the floor, feasting on my blood as
his body wraps around mine. My gaze lands on the cross on the wall above us, and I laugh at the irony.
I am the blood.
I am the sacrifice.
Hadrian is eternal life.
I watch him with hazy eyes as he slices his own wrist open with his thumbnail, offering me the thick red liquid seeping
from his wound. I accept his sacrament, feeling the blood spread through me, renewing me, liberating me. Just as he promised.
Hadrian watches me, a smile on his lips stained with my blood. “When you wake, we will make love right here on these
holy steps. I am your religion now, Cillian. You have made me so happy.”
Pain seizes my chest, but I do not cry out. I fix my gaze on Hadrian, knowing in the deepest part of me, somehow, that he is
everything he says he is.
“Beautiful Cillian. What a life we are going to have. Rest well, my sweet prince. I will be here when you wake, and we
will start our adventure.”
I have no idea what awaits me, and I do not care. Hadrian may be my ruin, but I accept it wholly.
May God have mercy on my dark soul.
 ONE

Yves (Cillian)

Present Day

Memories.
I’ve been haunted by them for weeks now. Why, after centuries, do they plague me?
Sitting on the edge of my bed, I rest my elbows on my knees, racking my brain for clues. I can’t stop seeing his face. There
are times I’d swear before Hades I caught his scent, but it’s impossible. He’s long dead. I would know if he lived.
Scrubbing my hands over my face, I finally push off the bed to prepare for the day. I have to face the council today with no
idea why the impromptu meeting is happening. The fact that it’s here in New Onyx concerns me. It must affect my domain.
An hour later, dressed and ready for the day, I exit my bedroom to head to my study. Viper is already at her desk, typing
away. She looks up, pausing with a pretty smile on her face.
“Well, well. Don’t you look extra handsome today. New suit?”
“Very old suit. I wear it to all council meetings. Call it superstition.”
“It’s working for you. You look hot. If I liked men and you liked mortals I’d be all over you.”
I laugh at her harmless flirting. “A compliment indeed.”
“I warmed a mug for you. It’s on your desk. We have two new client requests. I’m entering them into the database now.”
My chest warms with affection. “How did I get so lucky? First Vivienne and now you.”
“Uh, you totally deserve us.”
Bowing my head slightly, I retreat to my office. Sure enough, a mug of warmed blood sits on my desk. Vivienne got me
some kind of mug warmer that keeps it warm until I’m ready for it. So thoughtful.
Taking a seat at my desk, I sip my morning meal, but my thoughts are still consumed by memories of the past.
Images of my maker’s face whoosh by like leaves on a breeze. Hadrian. The man who promised love but delivered only
torment. Gods, I haven’t even thought that name in decades, much less recalled his face. But that’s not the worst of it. Not the
most painful memory.
Lorenzo.
Simply allowing the name to play in my thoughts causes pain. I thought I had killed his memory completely, but lately…it’s
been resurrected. Why? Only the gods know.
I feel Syn’s presence before I hear his knock on my door. “Enter.”
He does. Alone. I’m so used to seeing his mate by his side that the sight of him alone is almost startling.
“I want to come with you,” he says.
“It isn’t necessary.”
“Just the same.” He approaches me, coming to my side of the desk. “It’s unusual. You may need support.”
I nod, gazing up at the man I once loved. Or tried to love, at least. I press my hand to his torso, and his gaze softens.
“Something is happening to me, Syn.”
He kneels before me. “Something? What do you mean?”
“For weeks now the past has haunted me. Relentlessly. I don’t understand why.”
“The past?”
“At first, I wrote it off as memories compressing, but it’s more than that.” I focus on Syn’s face. “I can see my maker every
time I close my eyes.”
Syn’s brow creases. “Your maker? Hadrian?”
Nodding, I swallow hard. I haven’t heard his name spoken by another since I first told Syn about him. Whenever I repeated
the story after that, I left out his name.
“And…” I close my eyes briefly as more memories flood back. “The man I once loved.”
Syn’s expression hardens. “Marcello?”
He practically spits the name.
“No, thankfully. Long before him. I didn’t tell you about him. It was too painful.”
He rubs my thigh. “Do you want to tell me now?”
Gripping his hand in mine, I consider whether I’m ready to put words to my painful past. I’m not.
“No, but only because I don’t think I can yet. All I can say is that I lost him long ago.”
Syn nods, studying my face. “I’m going with you.”
“You should stay with your mate. I’ll be fine.”
“Bowie is fine. You need support. I won’t accept no as an answer.”
“Yeah, I’m coming too.” We both look to the door as Thorn enters. “No way are you going alone.”
Instead of fighting my brothers, I submit to their concern and affection for me. “If I’ve done anything right in this long life of
mine, finding all of you has been my biggest achievement. Your loyalty is my highest honor.”
Thorn, smacking his gum and leaning on the doorframe, just grins. “My dude, you’re everything to us. I stopped the others
from coming along. You’re welcome.”
I finally crack a smile. “I am a lucky man. We should get going. The meeting is downtown at the Mercurial Hotel.”
Syn whistles. “Posh digs.”
“Discreet digs as well,” I reply before draining the last of my breakfast. As I set the mug down, I glance at my brothers.
“Thank you for coming.”

Thirty minutes later, Thorn turns into the parking lot of the hotel, choosing the valet. The Mercurial is a Gothic delight, fitting
for an old-school vampire’s indulgent side. Its stone exterior, replete with spires and ornate entries, fits right in with the city’s
old-world vibe. On the rare occasion the council visits our city, they stay here.
My normally dormant pulse actually ticks up as we exit the SUV and walk together towards the door. I button my suit jacket
and smooth it down, bracing myself for whatever this is about. Though I’m their equal, I have always taken a passive role,
allowing my more power-hungry peers to run things. As a result, I sometimes feel as though I’m being taken to task. Perhaps I
should have led it when I had the opportunity, but my tiny slice of the world in New Onyx satisfies me.
“The vibe feels good,” Thorn notes as we pass through the lobby. “Anybody picking up on anything?”
“Just a bunch of vampires nearby,” Syn says. “Yves?”
“Nothing unusual.” No sooner are the words out of my mouth that I stumble, stopping in my tracks as I catch a vague scent.
“What is it?” Syn asks with his hand on my arm. “Danger?”
I shake my head. “No. I’m fine. Let’s continue.”
Syn nods, but both his and Thorn’s energy is heightened now as we enter the elevator. We exit on the eleventh floor where
the boardrooms are. Immediately, the air is thick. I feel their reverence for me as I enter the room. I am older than them, after
all.
The five vampires in the room stand to greet me, and I walk to each one to hug and kiss them, as is customary. Together we
make six sanctions, covering the United States’ vampire population. I take my seat in the empty chair, nodding to Syn and Thorn
as they exit the room and close the doors behind them.
“You brought an entourage, Yves?” Horus, the California governance vampire quips. “Don’t you trust us?”
“Entirely,” I answer. “They insisted on joining me and I deny my brothers nothing.” I fold my hands on the desk. “I am
curious though. What brings us together today?”
The tension my question causes unnerves me. All eyes move to Paolo, the de facto leader of our group. He governs most of
the East Coast, excluding New Onyx and a few smaller territories, and part of the southern states.
“We have some concerns of activity building near here,” Paolo says.
For years he pursued me and a spot in my bed. His looks finally wore me down, but we were woefully incompatible. Still,
I’d be a blind man not to recognize his Mediterranean beauty. Short jet-black hair, equally black eyes, and the sexiest mouth.
“What sort of activity?” I ask. “I’ve detected nothing.”
“We believe you’re being blocked,” Paolo continues. “Intentionally.”
I pull my head back and scoff. “Blocked? That’s impossible. The only person capable of hiding their existence from me is
my maker, and he’s dead.”
I notice the uncomfortable glances that pass around the room.
“What?” I ask. “Tell me.”
“We think there’s someone you should speak to,” Paolo says. “Someone who came to us first. He’s waiting in an adjoining
room.”
“Who?”
“His name is Damiano Honore. He’s been living in Europe.”
“I don’t know anyone named Damiano.”
Paolo nods. “Yes, well, he knows something about your maker.”
I back away from the table as foreboding fills me. “There’s nothing to know. The man has been dead for centuries. I saw
it.”
“Yves,” Paolo says, leaning toward me. “Speak to Damiano. It will make more sense then.”
“Fine. Where is he?” I’m out of my seat and looking around. “Take me to him.”
“Across the hall,” Paolo says, his voice tense. “He is not dangerous, but his message might be.”
I stomp toward the door, swinging it open to find my brothers alert. They obviously feel my emotions, but I lift my hand to
stop them as I stare at the closed door in front of me. After a brief knock, I twist the doorknob and enter, completely unprepared
for what’s in front of me.
The man before me turns away from the windows and when our eyes meet, I rush forward.
It’s not possible. It can’t be.
With a gasp, he falls to his knees, gazing up at me with wide lavender eyes. Eyes I’ve gazed into a million times. How is
this happening?
“Cillian,” he whispers.
“Lorenzo?” My chest seizes as I touch his cheek. “By the gods, it’s you.”
“You’re…you’re not dead.”
“You’re not dead.” I drop to my knees as well. “Lorenzo.”
The two of us can only stare at each other in shock and amazement. He exhales, and as he does, my eyelids flutter as his
scent swirls around me. I must be dreaming.
“Then I must be dreaming too,” Lorenzo says, showing that our connection is still very much intact. “There is so much to
say. So much to tell you, but first, the reason I’m here.” He rises effortlessly, holding my hand to help me to my feet.
His touch immediately heals a wound inside me. I can’t believe he’s really here. As we sit on the small couch in the room,
a thousand thoughts and memories cloud my mind. The scent, the memories, I wasn’t imagining any of it. Lorenzo was near.
He is still the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. Still smells like paradise. Nothing about him has changed at all—
understandably—but his impact on me is as fresh as the first time I laid eyes on him when our maker brought him to our home. I
was the first vampire our maker kept. Lorenzo was the second.
“Yves Orpheus,” Lorenzo says. “I would never have connected that name to you.”
“Damiano Honore. Beautiful.”
“I chose the French spelling of my last name as a memorial of sorts.”
“The same reason I chose Yves. To remember our time in France.”
“And Orpheus?”
“I saw it on an opera house passing through Europe.”
“You always loved opera.”
“Yes.” I squeeze his hands in mine. “I can’t believe you’re real. I’ve been plagued for months by your beautiful face,
wondering why fate would torture me so, but here you are. In my very backyard.”
His eyes soften. “You felt me? Still?”
“Yes. You couldn’t feel me?”
“I thought…” He smiles. “Honestly, I thought I was going mad, or that it was because of…” He sighs deeply. “Because of
Hadrian.”
“How could that madman affect us now?”
“He lives, Cillian. As sure as you and I live, so does he.”
 TWO

Yves

“Lives? That’s ludicrous. I would know if that were true.”

“He blocked us. I only know because of an interaction between him and a member of a friendly coven near where I live in
Spain. He told me all about it and that Hadrian is very much alive.”
“I saw him burn, Lorenzo.”
“He didn’t die. There’s rumor he sometimes goes by Adrian Spencer now. I don’t know where he’s been, but I know where
he’s going. That’s why I’m here. Why I found the council. I never imagined I would find you too.”
I want to kiss him. I desperately want to taste him again, but… “Gods, Hadrian lives?”
“And he is hell-bent on world domination. He has an army already.”
“What?”
“Nothing has changed for him. He still thinks he should control every vampire ever made. Only now, centuries later, there
are thousands of us. It’s like he’s been asleep for centuries and just woke up.”
“Perhaps he has.” This new knowledge sits heavy on my chest. “Why New Onyx?”
“No idea yet,” Lorenzo answers. “I only know because of a very helpful intuitive I see. He gave me the answers I needed. I
came to warn the council and they said I had to see you.” He scoffs a laugh. “They must have sensed our connection. Perhaps
your blood still lingers in my veins.”
“Lorenzo…there is so much to tell you.”
He stands abruptly, putting unwanted space between us. “Start by explaining why you denied me. I thought our love was
unbreakable.”
I open my mouth to defend myself but the doors to the room swing open and Thorn, Syn, and the council members pour in.
“Forgive the interruption. We have news,” Paolo says, guiding a twink of a man forward. I recognize him as the man who
delivered the invite to me at Lair two nights ago.
“In London,” the man begins. “A nest of vampires meet, led by one Adrian Spencer. My source tells me they will descend
on New Onyx in three days’ time. They are still unaware that we know about them.”
“How?” Lorenzo asks.
“My source is mortal,” the twink vampire answers. “A donor. Common in parts of Europe. An interesting case too. Their
compulsion doesn’t work on him.”
“One problem at a time,” Paolo states.
“Does anyone know why Hadrian is targeting New Onyx?” I ask.
The twink nods, focusing on me. “He’s coming for you, Yves Orpheus.”
“What the fuck,” I whisper.
“I will stay here with you, Yves,” Paolo says.
“I will stay too,” Lorenzo says. “Nothing could make me leave again. Not even Hadrian.”
Syn’s face screws up while Thorn looks confused. For once, I am at a loss for words. There is so much to explain. I’ve
never told my brothers about Lorenzo. I suppose I’ll start with the simplest of introductions.
“Gentleman, brothers, I’d like to introduce you to Damiano Honore, but I knew him as Lorenzo of the House of Hadrian. He
is number two.”
Paolo gasps. “Number two? You are a Legacy? An original?”
Lorenzo nods. “Hadrian is my maker.” He smiles as his eyes settle on me. “And Cillian, Yves as you know him, was—is,
perhaps—the love of my life.”
 THREE

Damiano

Cillian. In the flesh.

Now the flashbacks and familiar scents make sense. The closer I got to New Onyx, the stronger they were. I thought I might
be faced with Hadrian, but no. My love is here. I only need to know what went so wrong all those years ago.
Two men hover protectively beside him, eyeing me like I’m the villain. How wonderful to know he is so loved.
Yves. I play the name in my head over and over again. It fits him. An elegant name for an equally elegant man. He holds my
gaze as if no one else exists, the way he always did. There’s a million miles between us, but somehow none at all.
“Damiano,” Yves says, smiling. “These are two of my brothers, Syn and Thorn. I am their maker.”
I nod at both in greeting, picking up on their distrust of me.
“What’s next?” Paolo asks.
“We can’t just sit here and wait to be attacked. Not knowing Yves is his target,” Syn says.
“Yeah, no one touches him. Not on my watch,” Thorn adds, cracking his knuckles and eyeing me suspiciously.
“That is precisely what we have to do,” Yves says. “Hadrian is an immensely clever man. I’ll assume that hasn’t changed.
He grows stronger with each new vampire made. By now, he’s virtually indestructible.”
“We’re likely the only two people who can kill him,” I state. “And even then, we may not be successful.”
“Must he be killed?” Horus asks. “Is he not reasonable?”
Yves rubs his hands together, clearly in turmoil over something, but he’s blocked me from his thoughts. His brothers notice
as well, closing in around him, but Yves waves them off. He paces in front of the windows for a moment, his head bowed,
before he turns to face us.
“He is not reasonable. He is ruthless and will kill anyone in his way. Hadrian knows our weaknesses, and if he knows I
live, then he knows Damiano does too. We must block him from our thoughts but maintain awareness of his presence.”
“But you’re blocked from him,” Horus points out. “Is there a way around it?”
“Vivienne will know. She’s our house witch and very powerful.”
“Yves,” Syn says. “This sounds dangerous. We must prepare in some way.”
“It is dangerous, brother. There is nothing in existence more deadly and powerful than Hadrian. I tried to destroy him once
before and clearly it didn’t work.”
The ripple of pain that moves through Yves is as sharp as if it were my own. I want to hold him, comfort him, but now is
not the time.
“Yves is right,” I say. “Outside of gathering allies, there is nothing preemptive we can do to protect ourselves.”
“Bullshit,” Thorn spits. “Everyone can die.”
“We exist because he does,” Clyde, another vampire from the Midwest says. “His blood is inside of every one of us. We
are his puppets.”
“I am no man’s puppet,” Thorn says. “I will die defending Yves.”
“You may have to,” Horus spits.
“Perhaps your maker can help you understand what we’re up against,” Paolo says. “He knows him firsthand.”
Yves fixes his hazel eyes on my face, his expression a mixture of fear and determination. “I need your help.”
“You have it without doubt. I came before I even knew it was you. Now that I know that, nothing could drag me away.”
But we need to talk. Alone.
I send the thought, testing our connection. When Yves’s eyelids flutter and he nods, a lost part of me is found again.
“Where are you staying?” he asks.
“Here.”
“You should come to my home. Paolo too. We have room and it makes sense to stay together.”
 “And what of us? What should we do?” Clyde asks. “Wait?”
“Organize,” Yves answers. “Gather everyone you know who is loyal to you. I hate to say this, but if I know Hadrian, and I
do, we’re on the verge of war. If he wins…” Yves’s words fade away as he searches my eyes. “We die.”
“No!” Syn exclaims. “No,” he repeats, softer.
“Why would he want you to die?” Thorn asks.
Yves’s brow creases and I doubt that he’s ever told the story before. “I betrayed him. I had to.”
“The rumors are true then?” Paolo asks.
Yves nods, tearing his gaze away from me. “I remember as if it were yesterday. He…lost his way.”
“Mindless killing,” I continue. “Arrogance. He drew too much attention to us. He destroyed an entire village. Women,
children…”
“No one could stop him,” Yves says. “I tried…” He shakes his head to avoid the words, so I brace myself for a truth I may
not know. “I did everything I could. I devoted myself to his happiness. I gave him everything at the expense of others. He loved
me the most.”
“And it wasn’t enough?” Clyde asks.
“‘Enough’ doesn’t exist to him,” I reply. “He was mad with power. Frustrated with hiding. He wanted us to be out,
dominant, not only part of society, but in charge of it.”
“At a time when the Church was still burning women for perceived witchcraft,” Yves says. “Ahead of his time, perhaps,
but the nightly attacks on us were devastating. We lost many. Hadrian didn’t care. He just made more, often by force.”
“Turning people and abandoning them,” I explain. “He dishonored us and broke the rules he himself had made.”
“How did it end?” Thorn asks.
Yves glances at me again before turning away. “He took everything from me.” When he looks up, his eyes are glowing with
barely contained rage, the irises tinged red. “He stripped me of my dignity, my autonomy, my love.”
“Cillian,” I whisper the name, barely able to speak it.
“He isolated me,” Yves continues. “I was forced to stay and appease him. It was the only way to stop his rampaging. Every
time I tried to leave, his anger was terrifying.” Yves blinks away the emotion causing his voice to shake. “So when the mob of
vampires showed up at our home, I distracted him, fed him dead blood, and let them drag him outside where they beat him,
bled him, and finally, burned him.”
Meredith, a southwest vampire, gasps, clutching her chest.
“I stood by and watched them.”
“They would have killed you if you had intervened,” Paolo notes.
“I know, but do you think Hadrian cares about that?”
“No.”
“No,” Yves repeats. “He saw it as the act of betrayal it was, I’m sure.” He wrings his hands together. “But I should have
known it wasn’t enough to kill him. I’m responsible for what’s happening now.”
“No, Yves,” I say. “You couldn’t have known.”
“Couldn’t I? He told us how indestructible we were. He told us there are only two ways to die, and one of them didn’t
work on him.”
“Dead blood and decapitation.”
Yves nods. “I didn’t let them take his head. I couldn’t.” His voice breaks. “I felt as if I was burning on that fire. His
screams tortured me.”
Syn grips his maker’s hand, arousing my jealousy. “Yves,” he whispers.
“While they killed my coven off, I stole Hadrian’s body, and I ran into the forest. I buried him and hid out until morning
when I could return for a box that would become his coffin.”
My eyes sting with tears that stopped flowing centuries ago. Yves’s pain, his guilt, all of it is mine.
“I returned to our home to find my coven obliterated. Beheaded, burned, staked to the ground. I took the few things of value
I could find and I left.”
“What did you do with Hadrian’s body?” Paolo asks.
“Pushed it into the sea. I thought we would be safe that way. There was nothing there for him to eat. Nothing to restore him.
He would simply float to the bottom and stay there. Or so I thought.”
“There was no sign of life when you did this?” Clyde asks.
“None. He was just…a shell. Badly disfigured.” Yves clutches his chest. “He deserved what happened, but that knowledge
doesn’t make it any less painful.”
“And you, Damiano?” Emiko, another vampire who has been quiet until now asks. “Where were you during all this?”
“Gone,” I answer. “I had my reasons, but they are for Yves’s ears first.”
Thorn glares at me while Syn rubs Yves’s back. I sense the love and loyalty flowing between them, and I am happy he has
them, but I also want to send them away and be his comfort.
 He lifts his eyes to me, clearly aware of my thoughts, but his expression is passive.
“Hadrian wants revenge,” Yves says, flatly. “He wants to punish me. Unfortunately, I am not his sole target. In his mind, he
is our god. He wants our reverence, devotion, and complete submission.”
“Yeah, well, he can fuck a dagger,” Thorn says. “I’m loyal to no one but Yves.”
Yves smiles warmly. “What we have on our side is modernity. Hadrian had to be locked away somewhere all this time, or
it would have happened sooner. We have technology and our own covens and allies to support us. He has an ego and rogue
vampires. That won’t make it easy, but we are not entirely defenseless.”
“We’ll start making calls right away,” Meredith says. “Should we consider Yves our main contact?”
Paolo nods. “New Onyx is his. If it falls, we all do.”
 FOUR

Yves

Waiting in the hotel lobby with Syn and Thorn, my thoughts are utter chaos. Lorenzo is alive. And by the gods, Hadrian lives.
“Are you sure you want Damiano to stay with us?” Syn asks. “He seems to disrupt you.”
A dark chuckle bubbles out of me. “Disrupt me? Brother, there are no words for his effect on me.”
“You loved him once?” Thorn asks.
“I’m not sure I’ve stopped loving him. After he left I thought…” I pause. “These are words meant for him first. All I can
say is that it would be impossible for me to let him stay anywhere else now that I know he lives.”
“You didn’t even suspect it?” Syn asks.
“No. I searched for him for years before I found you, Syn. I traveled the world, and there was no trace. Then in Spain I
found…” I shake my head. “Something he never would have left behind. I believed him dead at that point. Until recently, I
never once caught his scent.”
“Is he…” Syn grips my hand. “Is he your mate?”
“No. I would have known. I’m not sure I care though. Fate has yet to show me another option.”
The elevator doors part and Paolo steps out first, followed by Lorenzo. I should adjust to calling him Damiano for
simplicity. Perhaps in private he can still be my Enzo.
“You’re sure you have space for us?” Paolo asks.
“I own a high-rise. There’s space. Fully furnished flats. Do you have a mate to invite?”
Paolo shakes his head. “No one serious.”
My gaze shifts to Damiano. “You?”
He shakes his head. “No, Yves.”
I nod, filled with relief. “Well, we should go. There’s work to do.”
We exit the hotel, waiting for the valet to bring the SUV around. Paolo scans the lot with an eagle eye, as if Hadrian would
just walk up to us. No. Whatever his plan is, it will be stealthy and deadly.
“I’ll sit in the back with Damiano and Paolo,” Syn offers.
I nod, knowing a bit of distance between me and Damiano is probably a good thing until we can be truly alone.
I have a million questions. Why couldn’t I find him? Why couldn’t I scent him? Why the fuck did he leave me alone with
Hadrian? My guard is up, ensuring he can’t connect to my thoughts, but I feel his prodding, his desperation to know what I don’t
say.
I take my spot in the passenger seat up front, smiling at Thorn as he pats my thigh before tearing off. The ride home is silent.
I imagine all of us are deep in our own thoughts about what we’ve learned.
The last thing I ever thought I would deal with again is Hadrian’s presence. I felt safe imagining him at the bottom of the
Atlantic, buried under debris and sand, unable to free himself. My guilt never left me though. Not entirely. I often questioned
whether my solution was kinder than death. Perhaps I should have let the vampires take his head. But then again, I may never
have found Damiano.
When we arrive at our building, Thorn swings into his parking space, glancing at me with questions in his eyes.
He’s safe, brother.
Thorn nods. I’m a thought away if you need me.
I pat his leg in acknowledgment before exiting the car. Syn takes the lead, guiding Paolo to the elevator while Damiano
falls into step beside me.
“You own this?”
I nod. “We’ve had mortals rent in the building, but as they’ve moved out, I’ve not replaced them. My initial plan was to
blend in with them, but there’s something to be said for having our own sacred space.”
 “Why would they leave such a beautiful building?” Paolo asks.
“Rent hike,” Thorn says, chuckling.
“Ah. Smart,” Paolo says.
“They definitely weren’t happy about it, but it was right for us.” I glance at Damiano. “We can be ourselves here, from the
ground floor to the roof.”
“Yeah, we were pushing it,” Thorn says. “Like the time we slaughtered a mafioso in the lobby.”
Syn scoffs a laugh. “He started it.”
“How many of you are there?” Paolo asks, his eyes appreciating Thorn.
“My coven consists of five and their mates, plus me and two women who are not vampires,” I explain.
“The scent of desire is strong here,” Paolo notes. “Someone is in love.”
“All of us are,” Thorn says just as the doors open on our floor. “We have found our mates.” His eyes move to me. “Perhaps
we all have.”
I ignore the comment, focusing on my brothers instead. “I am proud of the family I’ve created. Their mates are welcome
additions.”
“You have a mate too, Thorn?” Paolo asks.
“Sure do, big guy. We’re not polyam either. Sorry.”
“Lucky man or woman,” Paolo says with a polite smile.
“Man. Gorgeous, sweet man,” Thorn gushes. “You’ll meet him later.”
“Yes, um, let’s take Paolo to unit eight,” I say.
Syn focuses on me. “And Damiano?”
I want to say mine, but I know we have a lot to discuss before either of us warms the other’s bed. “Unit ten.”
Damiano and I hover in the hall as Thorn and Syn lead Paolo to his unit.
“Nice building,” Damiano says.
“Thank you. Do you need to get settled first before we…talk?”
“No, Yves, I don’t. I haven’t been settled a single day since I last saw your face. I want to talk and be alone with you.
Now.”
Nodding, I gesture towards my unit. “Right this way.”
All the gods. Damiano, my Enzo, is about to enter my home. If fate is truly kind, I pray we will never part again.
 FIVE

Damiano

I linger behind Yves as he opens the door to his apartment and steps inside. As soon as I cross the threshold, I’m unable to hold
back the one thing I’ve wanted since I saw his face again, and I rush forward, pressing our chests together in an embrace.
Yves wraps his arms around me and our mouths collide, soothing every broken and lonely part of me in an instant. Nothing
has changed. Our love didn’t die.
His lips part, inviting me in, and I accept, melting into him as he walks backward until he’s against the wall. The scent of
him washes over me, reviving me, erasing the centuries of longing.
“Cillian,” I whisper into his mouth.
“Enzo,” he whispers back, nipping my bottom lip. “My Enzo.”
“I never stopped missing you. Never.”
Yves pulls back slightly, his hands on both sides of my face. “Never?”
“No. I searched the world for you.”
“I did the same. How did we miss each other this long?”
Gazing into his eyes draws a bubble of joy from my depths and I simply laugh. “Gods. You’re in my arms again.”
Yves nods. “We should talk.”
“Yes, of course.”
Yves takes my hand and leads me to a sitting room. His home is exactly as I would have envisioned it. It’s elegant and
understated, but every detail is thoughtful and stunning, like the man himself. The only out-of-place item is a desk with a
computer at the end of the cavernous foyer.
“You work there?”
“No. Viper works there. She manages my business for me.”
“And she’s mortal?”
He nods as we sit on an oversized cashmere couch. “She is. A witch, but she knows what we are.”
“The witches and vampires get along in New Onyx?”
“All the vampires here are mine, and yes, we do. We have a club called Lair. The council and I decided New Onyx was the
right place for it. We do allow outside vampires in, but there are rules of engagement.”
“You’ve created what Hadrian always wanted.”
“I learned well before he lost his mind.”
I hold his hand in mine, stroking his skin. “What is your business?”
He chuckles. “We are assassins. Paid for by the city’s powerful and elite.”
“Brilliant,” I whisper. “You manage your bloodlust that way?”
Yves nods. “Yes. The innocents of the city are safe from us.”
“Your humanity lingers still, Father Cillian.”
“Hardly. What lingers is the need for peace. We stay in the shadows, hiding in plain sight, but it keeps us safe and happy.”
He searches my eyes. “No one has called me that in centuries.”
“Do your brothers even know of your past?”
“Bits and pieces. Not that. I forget myself sometimes. It was a lifetime ago that I wore the collar of the Church.”
“A lifetime I remember well.” My chest tightens as my next, most pressing question rises up. “Why did we part, Yves?”
“I don’t know why you’re asking me that when you’re the one who left. I still have your letter.”
“What letter? It was you who sent me away.”
Yves stares at me like I’ve gone mad. “No, Damiano, no. Your letter told me that your heart belonged to another.”
I pull my head back. “I did not write that. Your letter told me that only Hadrian had your heart. My presence distracted you.
It broke my heart, but I would never stand in the way of your happiness, even if it meant my destruction.”
Yves scoffs, fixing his eyes on our entwined hands before drawing them up to my face again. “He manipulated us. I wrote
no letter. You wrote no letter. I would have burned the world down to follow you, but he made me believe…” He shakes his
head. “He made me believe you never loved me.”
“How could you believe him?”
“How did you? He had total control over us, and our love defied that.”
“Bloody hell, Yves. We lost centuries because of his lies?”
Yves rubs his chest as his eyes cloud over. “Gods, Damiano, what he put me through after you left. He was relentless in his
punishment.”
“Punishment? For what?”
“For loving you. Betraying him. He believed we should only love him. I paid with my body and soul for giving you my
heart.”
“Yves—”
“I would do it again. You were worth it.”
“What did he do to you?”
Yves shakes his head. “For months, he kept me locked in his room. He fed me, washed me, fucked me. My release was
dependent on his believing I loved him again, and that I wouldn’t search for you. He spent nights filling my head with all the
things he said you told him. He said you met a man, a traveler from another village, and that your heart was fickle. You never
loved me. You were passing time.”
Rage simmers inside me. “That bastard. He was jealous of us. We always knew that.”
Yves nods, rising. He turns his back to me, gazing out the large windows on the city below. “He told me he would fuck your
memory out of me, and if that didn’t work, he would beat it out of me.” Yves turns to face me. “And if that didn’t work, he
would find you and kill you and give me your head.”
“Fuck.”
“So I pretended. I showered him with affection and love I no longer felt. I locked away your memory, knowing someday I
would get away from Hadrian, and I would find you, and I would beg you to love me again. Because he didn’t fuck away my
love for you. He couldn’t.”
“Yves, my beautiful man.”
“I have searched for a love like ours for centuries. Those men I call my brothers were my attempts at filling the void you
left. I gave my heart to so many, but none compared to you. I finally gave up decades ago. My last attempt nearly destroyed me.
I resigned myself to feeling love through my brothers and their mates, and I hoped it was enough.” He shakes his head. “But it
was never enough.”
I rise and approach him. “I never stopped loving you. Not a single day. I never even tried to. I knew it wasn’t possible. Not
you. Not what we had.”
“I thought you were dead.”
“Why?”
“Because I couldn’t feel you anymore. Because…” Brow creased, he turns away from me and walks down a hallway,
returning seconds later with a small box. “Because I found this.”
I take the box and open it, gasping at the jewelry inside. “My ring.”
“It was found in a burned-out building in Spain. Someone was trying to sell it at a street market. I knew, or at least
believed, you would never leave it behind intentionally. I went to that burned ruin.” He closes his eyes. “Your scent was
everywhere. I believed I had lost you for good.”
As his voice cracks, I wrap my arms around him, nuzzling my nose into his hair. “We were run out of town by a mob. I
dropped it, and I never dared go back for it. But you found me again.”
“You found me.”
“And I will never let you go.” I step back and rub my thumbs over his cheeks. “My gods, Yves, your beauty staggers me
still. The only thing Hadrian did right was to unite the two of us. Now we fight against him together.”
“He clearly went to great lengths to avoid us reuniting. We should become his worst nightmare.”
“I believe our love already was.” I run my hand down his chest. “We’ve danced around each other for centuries, you and I,
always missing the other, but Yves, my beloved Cillian, surely we can both see that this is no coincidence. It can’t be an
accident, any more than it was when Hadrian chose me to join you both. Fate intertwines our destinies. We were always meant
to find each other again.”
A hopeful, serene expression spreads across Yves’s features. “What are you saying, Damiano?”
“I am yours, Yves Orpheus. If you’ll have me, my heart is eternally yours. If you won’t have me, I’ll stake my own heart.”
“Wouldn’t we know if we were fated?”
“We are fated as I say so. If fate did not choose it for us, then she is misguided, for there could never be anything more
perfect than us. I know you believe it. I know you love me still. I can feel your heartbeat dancing with mine. I’ve waited
centuries to see your beautiful face. I convinced myself you must have been dead, or I would have found you. Well, I tried. My
heart refused to accept it. Tell me you love me. Let me hear it.”
“I swear to Hades, I love you. I have always loved you. I will until time ends.”
“Then fate be damned. We choose our own destiny, and mine is you. It’s always been you.” I grip his hand. “Take me to
your bed, Yves. Give yourself to me. Let me worship you again.” With my free hand, I cup his face. “But be gentle with me. I
am raw and broken, but you can put me back together again.”
Yves kisses me hard before pressing our foreheads together. “Come, my love. You have been missed.”
 SIX

Yves

A storm of emotions brews within me. The part of me that so desperately wanted to believe this man was my fated mate, the
thought I clung to for decades until I finally let go, breathes again. But the logical side is too afraid to hope again. Which side
will win?
Damiano’s hand is warm and firm in my grip, his excitement as palpable as mine. I open the door to my bedroom, a place
that has been devoid of passion for far too long, and a strange flutter moves through me.
“I feel it too,” Damiano whispers, kissing my neck from behind. “I haven’t experienced pleasure even close to what you
and I created together.”
I twist in his embrace to gaze into his eyes. “The search for a love like ours has been fruitless and painful.”
“For me as well. We know it’s because nothing like our love exists. Nothing. It’s as new and fresh today as it was the first
time I knew.”
Brushing my fingers down his cheek, I ask, “Do you remember when we met?”
Damiano chuckles. “It might be the only thing I remember. In my darkest moments, I would close my eyes just to see your
face.” With his arm around my waist, we sway to silent music. “I was so confused, so drunk on Hadrian’s compulsion. I was
sure I was following him to my death, and in a way, I was.”
“Yes.”
“But then you came down the stairs, and it was as if nothing else existed. I think he felt it even then.”
“I know he did. He just believed his own allure was stronger than all others’.”
“He was wrong. I fell harder for you every day, even in the face of his suffocating attention.”
“I both hated and loved the times I was forced to watch him make love to you. I hated it because I wanted to be him, but I
loved it because in a way, I could feel you too.”
“He never made love to me, Yves. He isn’t capable of love. He never was.”
I nod, recalling those intimate moments. “I still remember the first time your lips touched mine. If Hadrian’s kiss rebirthed
my soul, yours revived my joy.”
Damiano smiles. “All the gods, Yves, look at us. In spite of everything, here we are. Together as we always should have
been.”
“And if fate is kind, I pray we will never part. I couldn’t take it a second time.”
“I couldn’t either.” His eyes flicker behind me to the bed. “Your room is everything a king’s should be.”
Scoffing, I shake my head. “I am no king.”
“You’re still humble, I see, but is this not a kingdom you’ve created? An empire, at least. All your success hasn’t changed
that about you.”
“I have my moments. My heart is full of pride for the family I’m so fortunate to have. I chose wisely, except for one.”
“I want to know about that one. I want to know everything that’s happened since we parted.”
“I want to know about your life too.”
Damiano grins. “Well, lucky for us, we have all the time in the world. Even with the threat of our maker looming, we have
eternity.”
“I wish I shared your hubris, but we have to be realistic. He’s the only living being truly capable of destroying us. He
wouldn’t kill us, Damiano. He’d do far worse.”
His grin fades as he nods. “A problem for the morning, my love. The night, this night, is ours, no matter what comes next.”
He leans close to kiss my cheek. “Have your tastes changed over the centuries?”
“Not for you. You may take everything I have. I willingly give it to you.”
Just saying the words lights up my nerve endings in a way I haven’t experienced in ages, perhaps since the last time
Damiano touched me.
“You still feel safe with me?” he asks.
“Of course. My soul is content in your arms.”
Damiano smiles as he steps back enough to put a bit of space between us. He unbuttons my shirt, and as my flesh is
revealed, his eyes glow with desire.
“Still my favorite color,” I whisper. “Your eyes. So beautiful. Magical even.”
“We are magic, Yves. We shouldn’t even exist, but we do. We shouldn’t be able to love, but we do. We shouldn’t be so
stunning, but we are. We’re monsters underneath it all, but somehow, we are beautiful.” He rubs my bare chest. “Do you know
why?”
I shake my head, entranced by his lustful gaze. “Tell me.”
“Because despite everything he did to us, despite what the world has done, despite our ugliest parts, we still seek the
beauty this existence offers.”
“Yes,” I whisper, leaning close to taste his kiss again.
He dodges me, smiling. “Sit on the bed, Yves.”
I do as I’m told, my stomach fluttering. “No one tells me what to do. No one even tries.”
“But you crave it,” he says, removing his own shirt. “You pine for the feeling of letting it all go and just giving in to
pleasure.”
I nod.
“You never felt safe enough,” he says as his slacks drop. “Not even with your brothers, who I expect were lovers at first.”
“Yes.” My eyes roam over the smooth, muscular plains of his body. “I shouldn’t be surprised by your everlasting beauty,
and yet I am staggered.”
With a brilliant smile, he slinks toward me, stepping between my legs when he reaches me. “Says the most perfect creation
in existence. Hadrian is a lot of things, but he can never be taken to task over his eye for the exquisite.”
Damiano tugs at my pants. I lift my hips off the bed to help him.
“I can only imagine his thrill when he defiled a priest,” Damiano whispers. “He knew you were a treasure. Still are.”
“Your treasure. I was never his. Not in the ways that mattered.”
“Oh, I know.” He inhales deeply, his eyelids fluttering. “Gods, Yves. I feel brand new again simply being in your presence.
Your scent heals me.”
I grip the back of his neck and pull his mouth to mine, ending the recollections of the past, at least for now. “I’ve waited
centuries to feel you inside me again.”
“Five hundred and seventy-one long years since I last saw your face. Four months, two weeks, and three days.” Damiano
smiles as my jaw drops. “But who’s counting?”
“Dami…”
“Yes, I felt every minute of it.” His hand roams across my collarbone. “But that’s all gone now.”
Damiano descends on me with a kiss I can feel to my toes. I relax into it, blessedly giving up the control I so tightly cling
to. It’s how I’ve kept myself together for so long. If not for my brothers, I would have gone mad ages ago, but now, I’m safe
once more. Damiano, my Enzo, is here.
 SEVEN

Damiano

“A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is reality.”
Yves smiles as our kiss dissolves into shared breath. “Who said that?”
I chuckle. “John Lennon. He was such a poet.”
“Did you know him?”
“I did a bit. I lingered around him when he was overseas. That particular quote stayed with me though, because I think a
part of me hoped you lived, and that someday, our dream would be reality again.”
“Maybe I still live because you do.”
I run my hand down his chest, savoring the softness of his skin. “We never change, we can’t, yet what a marvel to feel the
flesh I so desired. So familiar, as if no time has passed.”
I glide my hand farther down, and Yves’s gasp is music to me as I grip his thick cock. “You were always so bountiful in
your physical gifts. How fortunate I am to harvest them.”
“Damiano,” Yves whispers. “Please don’t taunt me. I can’t bear it. There’s time for your delicious teasing, but not tonight.”
Chuckling, I squeeze him, inhaling as his precum scents the air around us. “My beautiful Yves. The name suits you. I like
how it plays on my tongue.” I scoot down and drag my tongue on his belly. He shivers, arching into me. “I may faint upon
tasting you again after so long, but it’s a risk I’ll take.”
I finish my descent down the slope of Yves’s delectable body, nearly delirious in the knowledge that this isn’t a dream.
Finally, my beloved is in my clutches once more.
I lick a stripe along his erection, smiling as it bounces and leaks a bit more. Beautiful. So thick and veiny, with just a tinge
of pink. I’ve seen it a million times in my mind, fucked myself to its memory, and now, it’s real.
Opening my mouth, I take him in, relaxing my throat to swallow his length, and we both moan. Yves’s is loud, vibrating
through both of us, and his fingers tangle in my hair. We are not gentle lovers—at least, we never were before—and I pray to
any deity listening that Yves’s bottled-up passion bursts free.
“Gods,” Yves moans, pumping his hips to fuck my throat. “You are masterful with your mouth.”
I spread Yves’s legs apart, swallowing him whole and burying my nose in his tidy pubic hair. Getting all of Yves’s cock in
anyone’s mouth is only for the immortal. His appendage is supernatural all on its own.
“It’s too much.” Yves moans. “You’re too good.”
Chuckling, I pop off him and climb back up his body to taste his kiss again. Yves wraps his legs around me, knocking our
cocks together.
“Fuck me,” he says, biting my bottom lip. “The way only you can.”
“Ah, my beautiful, come get your cock. It’s been waiting for you.”
A gorgeous smile lights up his face as he rubs our noses together before pushing me backward. My entire body trembles in
anticipation. My stunning lover is a voracious bottom and a bossy one at that. When Yves is in charge, it’s hard to know who is
fucking and who is being fucked.
He straddles my chest, allowing me access to finger his hole and lick the tip of his cock again. I moan at the touch. “You’re
so soft.”
I dig into him, watching his face twist in pleasure as I finger fuck him. He needs no prep—a vampire never does—but that
doesn’t stop us from indulging in the joys of foreplay. When he’s ready, he shifts back and grabs the base of my cock.
“How many times have I fantasized about feeling you inside me again.” He shifts his gaze to me, hazel eyes glowing like
they’ve caught the sun. He drags his tongue across his fangs and slides down my shaft.
Both of us freeze for a second, simply entranced by the moment. “Oh, Yves. My gods, Yves. You were made for me.”
He moves up and then down again, slowly, methodically. “I believe I was. He made us so we could find each other.”
 I slide my hand over his belly, then his hip, then his cock. “It must be true.”
I stare at my lover, almost in stunned disbelief that this is happening. But my soft reverie ends as Yves takes charge. A grin
spreads across my face as Yves fucks himself on my cock. His body clenches around me, milking me to the edge, then expertly
falling back. He still knows exactly how to excite me, even after all this time.
“How many times I’ve gotten myself off imagining it was you,” Yves whispers, riding me wildly. “How many lovers’ faces
I replaced with yours. How many nights I was on the brink of madness from missing you.”
“Too many to count,” I reply, gripping his hips. “Please, my love, I must taste your essence. I have to.”
His eyes glimmer with pure affection and desire as he uses his sharp thumbnail to slice into his pec muscle.
I bolt upright, gripping his shoulders and latching onto his wound. As his blood coats my tongue and drips down my throat,
I can no longer hold back. The orgasm is explosive. Literal centuries of longing and despair release at once, filling my lover’s
body while his blood spreads through me, uniting us once again.
Yves leans forward, still bouncing on my pulsing cock, and sinks his teeth into my neck where it meets the fleshy part of my
shoulder. I cry out Yves’s name, overwhelmed by the sensation of his teeth in me again. My lover feeds, and something deep
and broken rises to the surface, healed and new again.
“My beloved,” I whisper. “Take all you can handle. I am so happy.”
He mumbles and then moans as his cock twitches between us, spilling warm, sticky cum. The scent of it, combined with the
heady earthiness of his blood, sends another wave of pleasure through me. My cock twitches and his body reacts, clenching
around me.
We ride it out together, slowing down, but holding on tightly to each other. Yves laps at my skin before rubbing his nose into
the crook where he fed. I reach between us and scoop up his cum, licking my fingers.
“By the gods, there is no better elixir than you. I am whole again, Yves. My beloved. How did I persist without you?”
Yves pulls back enough to meet my gaze. “Will, spite, love. Maybe fate. Whatever it was, let’s be thankful it’s over. Now
that I’ve found you again, nothing will tear us apart. Not even our maker.”
Cupping his cheek, I search his eyes. “He won’t survive us together. Maybe that’s why he made sure we were apart. Can
you imagine his face when he finds out it didn’t work?”
“His demise fuels my rage. He chose New Onyx for a reason, but it was a fateful mistake. I’m not the same passive,
broken-spirited vampire he tried to ruin. He will feel the full force of my vengeance.”
“We will bathe in his blood and mount his head on our gate.”
“And when it’s over, we’ll be free. Truly free.”
 EIGHT

Yves

“I wonder how he kept us blocked from his presence all this time,” Damiano muses as he plays with my hair.
I’m lying on his chest, utterly amazed by it all. My ass is pleasantly sore, my chest throbbing from his feeding.
“He’s always been clever. He found a way.” I tilt my face up. “But he kept us blocked from each other too. That alone is
reason enough to destroy him.”
Damiano nods. “Agreed.”
“I want to show you something.” I slip from the bed and cross the room to my armoire. Inside is the letter Thorn and Kyson
presented to me a few months ago. When I turn around again, Damiano is sitting straight up.
“What do you have?” he asks.
“A letter. I never opened it. I couldn’t.”
“Yves.” He’s out of bed and across the room in a blink. “It’s from me, isn’t it?”
“I think so. Your scent was ever so faint. Thorn stole it from a museum here in town with a vampire exhibit. He said it
called out to him for some reason.”
“Why didn’t you read it?”
“I think I was afraid of what it would say. I thought it would be all I had of you besides the ring. It was too much to bear.”
He smiles, taking the fragile letter from me. “I will read it to you. I know exactly what it says. It’s not a letter, Yves. It’s a
diary of sorts. Sit, my beloved, and listen.”
Nodding, I move to the armchair next to the fireplace and take a seat. I must thank Thorn again for his instinct, and that
darling mate of his for showing him the exhibit in the first place.
“February, seventeen-twenty,” Damiano begins after carefully unfolding the sheets of paper. “Amsterdam is cold. Frigidly
so. It’s days like this my mind torments me with thoughts of a warmth I knew once upon a time. A warmth no fire could compete
with. I see his face in the falling snowflakes and my nearly dead heart twists in my chest.”
I rub my own chest, listening to his words.
“Cillian would love it here, I think,” Damiano continues. “He would enjoy the architecture. He was always fascinated by
it. Perhaps he could have been a builder if the Church hadn’t called to him.”
Damiano walks in a small circle, his energy dripping with sad nostalgia.
“I have prayed, begged to any deity listening to take his memory away, to show me mercy, but relief never comes. I am
haunted by memories of a love so real and deep I will never have it again. I’ve tried to hate him for choosing Hadrian over me,
but trying to hate Cillian is like hating the moon for shining, hating flowers for blooming, hating rain for falling. It’s impossible
and fruitless. So instead I lie here in a dark, cold flat, facing another night alone but allowing the memories of our love to warm
me.”
He folds the paper in half, wiping away a tear of blood that slips from his eye. His pain is powerful to draw a tear after all
these centuries alive.
“Dami…”
“I left it in that flat. I left all my notebooks there. For some reason, Amsterdam made the memories stronger. I don’t know
why.”
“I was there, Damiano. I was with you.”
His jaw drops. “You were… At the same time?”
“Seventeen-twenty? Yes. We spent a few months there on our way to the Americas. Once again, we circled each other but
missed.”
Damiano’s eyes harden. “I cannot wait to torture the truth from him. What he did to us, Yves…”
“He took a lifetime from us.”
 “Several lifetimes. I thought I was going mad because I couldn’t forget you.”
I scoff a laugh. “I understand. I did the same.”
Damiano walks back to the bed, places the letter on the nightstand, and sits. “Come back over here.”
Rising, I join him on the bed once again.
“Tell me about your family,” Damiano says. “Who was first?”
“Syn,” I answer. “He was with me today.”
“The two men with you love you. Deeply. I felt it.”
“Yes, I am a fortunate man to have found them and enjoy their affection and loyalty.”
“But they have mates now?”
“Fated,” I answer with a smile. “It fills me with pride that I led them to this happiness. They don’t love me romantically,
not anymore. I admit that my motivation for turning each of them was misguided. I desperately wanted to find the mate destined
for me, so for a time, any man who caught my eye in a particular way, became mine.”
“I want to be jealous of them, but I have the benefit of knowing your heart. Your love is…” He pauses, waving his hands in
the air. “Unique. There’s a romantic undertone, but at the same time, it’s familial.”
I nod, taking one of his hands in mine to play with his fingers. “I suppose romantic love never truly fades completely, but I
haven’t sought that from any of them since the early 1800s. Thorn, the other man with us today, was my last attempt of my
surviving brothers.”
“You didn’t get what you wanted?”
“What I needed. To be fair, it was an unrealistic goal to find another love like ours. I don’t regret what I did though. I adore
my family.”
“There is another you don’t speak of.”
I nod as my mood darkens slightly. “Marcello. I regret him with all that I am. I destroyed him and he nearly destroyed me.”
“He’s dead?”
“Very much so.” I pat Damiano’s chest. “I will tell you about it someday, but please, not tonight. His memory turns my
stomach.”
Damiano’s eyes flash with wild rage until he blinks it away. “He is lucky to be dead, or I would make sure of it now.”
“You and my brothers. After Marcello, I gave up searching. I shoved it down and focused on building a life worthy of the
men who trusted me with their immortal souls. We decided to stay in the New World. It was exciting and lawless in our eyes.
We survived vampire hunters, changes in attitudes toward homosexuality, revolutions, and civil unrest. It was thrilling.
Different from Europe.”
“I came here on occasion, but I stayed in Europe, hoping somehow I’d find your trail again.” He shakes his head. “I never
considered you would settle here.”
“For some reason it suited me. We found Thorn here.”
“His energy is wild.”
I chuckle. “You have no idea. I was a fool thinking I could tame him, but it was worth the effort. He’s been a rock for me
over the years. I’m close to them all, but Syn and Thorn have a special place. They seem to understand me better, or perhaps
more deeply, than the others.”
“Five in all?”
“Yes. You’ll meet them later.” I smile. “And now we’ve doubled in size with their mates. Even now, I can feel their
simmering curiosity. They know you’re here, but they have no idea exactly who you are to me. They want love for me more
than I even wanted it for myself. Be prepared for when they find out. They will smother you with their concern and
protectiveness of me.”
“I can handle it. I welcome it, Yves. No one could love you more than me. It would be impossible. Let them pick me apart.
I bare myself to their scrutiny. I will prove my devotion. There is no doubt.”
I cup his face. “All this time searching for something I already had.”
“Close your eyes, beloved. Let’s remember together the night we broke all the rules.”
Clasping our hands together, we lie back, both of us with our eyes closed. Memories rise above us, swirling around us,
creating images we can both see in our minds. That’s how strong our connection is. How strong it was when we first met.
“Lorenzo, we can’t do this. If he finds out…”
“Hadrian be damned, Cillian.” Lorenzo touches my face, backing me against the wall behind us.
“Your touch…” I shake my head. “He’ll kill us.”
“Your love is worth it. Your kiss, sweeter than any death.”
I gasp as my body vibrates in reaction to the vivid memory. Damiano squeezes my hand, humming softly.
“Tell me my desire is not in vain, my beautiful Cillian. I know you feel it too. I know it as surely as I know the sky is
above us. But please, darling, please give me your words.”
“Lorenzo…” My heart seems to beat in my throat as desperate desire grips me.
 His hand moves down my body and between my legs, stroking my cock as his lips tease mine.
“Tell me, Cillian, and there is nothing I would not do for you. No punishment I would not endure. Please. Just a kiss.”
Gazing into lavender pools glowing with desire, I nod, parting my lips. “Take of me, Enzo. Whatever you want, it is
yours.”
His hand moves to the back of my neck, drawing us closer until the inevitable happens. Our lips touch, and in an instant
I know I would give my life for this man.
“Cillian,” Lorenzo whispers as he flicks his tongue along the seam of my lips.
I open to him, melting into the strange warmth of his mouth. Why does his kiss taste like sunshine and Hadrian’s tastes
like hell itself?
He breaks the kiss, holding my gaze. “I am so madly in love with you, Cillian. My heart is yours. No matter what
happens, it is always yours.”
Closing my eyes, I try to deny the truth, knowing the danger it puts us in, but perhaps I do not care anymore. Perhaps a
love like this is worth any repercussions.
“I love you, Enzo,” I whisper. “I love you with all that I am. I am willing to risk it all for you.”
The smile on his face could light a midnight sky. “Ah, my beautiful man. If he staked my heart tonight, I would perish a
happy man.” He sinks to his knees, unbuttoning my trousers. “But while I still live, let me worship at your feet.”
“All the gods, Yves,” Damiano says. “I can feel everything you felt. Every thought you had.”
“Then you know how much I truly loved you.”
He rolls over on top of me. “And you know how much I loved you in that moment. I only wish to prove how much I still
do.”
“You have nothing to prove. I feel it, as clear now as it was then.”
“Every dream we had is at our fingertips. I said it then and I will say it again. Hadrian be damned. Let us begin his journey
to the underworld.”
I brush my fingers across his cheek. “The world is ours once more. Will you come meet my family now?”
“Yves, my beloved, don’t you know I will always do anything you ask of me? Demand I carve out my heart and hand it to
you, and I will with my dying breath. I deny you nothing.”
“How is it you haven’t changed at all? The world has worn its mark on me, but you? Nothing.”
“Long story I’ll happily share, but please, first let’s meet your family. I owe them my great thanks for loving you until I
could be with you again.”
As we dress, my mind swirls with emotions, from joy to concern to abject fear of losing him again.
“It’ll be okay, Yves,” Damiano says. “He went to great lengths to keep us apart, but for me, it only strengthens my resolve
to defeat him.”
“I know.” I button my shirt. “I also know how formidable he is.”
“Don’t underestimate us. Besides, we have an army of our own. I feel them on the other side of these walls.”
A smile pulls at my lips. “Yes. Let’s go.”
 NINE

Damiano

When Yves opens the door to his unit, I’m hit with a wave of emotions. Everything from curiosity to protectiveness to pure
affection. There’s no talking, only several men facing me. Sniffing the air, I lift my head slightly.
“There’s a mortal here.”
“Two mortals,” one of the men I was with earlier—Syn, I think—says. “Our sisters join us.”
Sure enough, in a large open room set up like a living room, two women sit together on an oversized armchair. Energy
pours off one of them, a pretty redhead.
“You are deceptive,” I say to her. “A flower maiden on the surface, but a force of nature beneath it. I bet that serves you
well.”
She smiles as the other woman gazes at her in awe. “That’s me. Vivienne, house witch. Pleasure to meet you.” She turns to
face the woman beside her, a raven-haired beauty with tattoos and a much softer energy. How odd. “This is Viper.”
“I take care of the business side of the House of Orpheus.”
“You are also a witch?” I ask.
“Not as powerful as Viv, but I do okay.”
“How fortunate you are, Yves.”
He chuckles. “You have no idea.” With his hand in mine, he leads me farther into the room. “Where is Paolo?”
“Sleeping,” Syn says. “Apparently he’s very nocturnal and follows an old-school pattern when he can.”
“Interesting,” I murmur.
“Very well. Paolo isn’t needed for this discussion. Brothers, sisters, I have someone for you to meet.” Yves smiles,
squeezing my hand slightly. He walks to Syn, a darkly handsome man. With him is another man with longish hair and doe eyes.
“This is Syn,” Yves says. “My first. And his mate, Bowie.”
They both nod at me.
Yves gestures to the man next to Syn. While Syn has a dark nature about him, this man is the embodiment of night. On his
lap is a pretty little thing, gazing at me with big eyes.
“Midnight,” Yves says. “My second. His mate, Tru.”
“Welcome,” Tru says sweetly, while Midnight regards me suspiciously.
“Thank you.”
“Eros,” Yves says, walking to the man with long blond hair. Next to him on the window seat is a man with a complex but
welcoming energy. “His mate, Justice. More on how they met later.”
Eros chuckles. “Hello.”
“Hi.”
The next man looks like he stepped out of a renaissance painting, with wavy locks and a perfect face. His lover wraps
around him like an extra appendage.
“Raphael,” Yves says. “And his mate, Haven.”
Raphael says nothing, but his energy towards me is kind. His mate studies me curiously but remains silent as well.
“And Thorn,” Yves says. “My final addition to the family.”
“Saved the best for last,” Thorn says, chuckling, while the gorgeous little man beside him rolls his eyes.
“And so humble,” the man says. “I’m Kyson. Thorn’s mate.”
“Pleasure to meet you all. What an amazing life you have, Yves.”
Yves nods. “I want to tell you all something. Damiano is⁠—”
A loud buzzer interrupts Yves, and Thorn jumps out of his seat. “Oh shit. They’re early.”
“Now?” Eros asks.
 “Yeah. Please.”
“What’s going on?” Kyson asks.
“It’s a surprise,” Thorn says, already heading toward the door. “You stay here.”
Eros and Justice rise, ushering us all into the foyer.
“Close your eyes, Kyson,” Justice says.
“What is this about?” Yves asks.
“Oh, just wait,” Syn answers. “It’s very Thorn.”
“Well then, it could be anything,” Yves says dryly, but I can sense his affection for his brother.
Seconds later, metal doors open near the back of the foyer and Thorn appears with two men behind him. The men,
vampires, each carry massive wood coffins. Yves’s jaw drops.
“Right here is good,” Thorn says, directing the men to stop in front of his lover.
The men set the coffins down and Thorn opens each, revealing stunning baby blue silk interiors and plush bedding. With a
huge grin on his face, he clasps his hands together.
“Open your eyes, beautiful boy.”
Kyson blinks his eyes open, taking a second to focus before he notices the coffins. “Thorn! No. You… Wow.”
Thorn is beaming now as Kyson rushes forward, running a hand over the coffin lid.
“You got this for me?”
“For us. Just like you’ve always wanted.”
“Kyson wants to sleep in a coffin?” Justice muses.
“I don’t think we’ll be doing much sleeping in them,” Thorn answers, wiggling his eyebrows.
Kyson swings around and lunges into Thorn’s arms, attacking his face with kisses. “You listen to everything.”
“I’m your mate, darling. It’s my purpose in life to give you everything you want.”
Something twists in my chest as my eyes settle on Yves. He turns to me at the same time, both of us filled with longing for
the same thing.
Thorn smiles, still holding his mate. “Sorry for the interruption, Yves.”
“It’s fine. They are beautifully crafted.”
Thorn nods. “A place in France makes them.”
“I kind of want one,” Tru muses.
Midnight actually smiles. “They are more beautiful than comfortable.”
“Let’s focus on our guest,” Syn says, ever the serious one, it seems. I can see what drew Yves to him.
Yves takes my hand, leading me back to the sitting room. Everyone gathers around us, and the amount of love and affection
aimed at Yves is almost overwhelming. While my time away from him was nothing but darkness and pain, his time away from
me was filled with love. I swear another wound of mine just healed.
“As I was saying, This is Damiano Honore,” Yves begins. “We met in the year thirteen fifty, when my maker, our maker,
brought him home. He was Lorenzo then, and I was Cillian.”
“Father Cillian,” I add. “Though he had long abandoned his collar by that point.”
“No way,” Vivienne says. “You were a priest, Yves?”
Yves nods, chuckling. “Can you imagine it? Me, dedicated to the Church.”
“Did you really believe in it?” Thorn asks.
Yves twists his head back and forth. “I desperately wanted to. I begged the Christian god to wash away my desires. I
enjoyed helping people, but it was a difficult existence.”
“How did your maker find you?” Eros asks.
Yves leans back in his seat, his shoulder pressing slightly into mine as our bodies overlap. “He hunted me. He was passing
through town, looking for someone to defile, and he decided it would be me.”
“How did it happen?” Midnight asks. “You’ve never told us.”
Yves chuckles darkly. “Hadrian Vitellius Germanicus.” Yves says his name slowly.
The name moves through me uneasily.
“Gods, I haven’t uttered that name in centuries.” Yves glances at me. “Hadrian was the first man ever afflicted with
vampirism.”
“The first vampire ever?” Viper asks.
“It all started with him. To our knowledge, we are the only two survivors from our original coven. Until earlier today, I
thought I was alone.”
I brush my hand against his. “Can you tell it?”
Yves nods. “I think so.” He offers a subtle smile, shifting his gaze to his family. “As Hadrian told it, he played a very
dangerous game and lost. Hadrian’s taste for power started at a young age. He toyed with the darkness, seeking a way to
elevate his lot in life. One fateful evening, he found it.”
 Yves takes a moment to compose his thoughts. The disruption he feels rolls through me.
“Hadrian says he summoned a demon, some ancient entity rumored to give out anything your heart desired, but you had to
win a game of skill against it. Hadrian’s memory of the actual details of the game was erased, but he won. Now, we all know
playing with demons is tricky, and Hadrian’s demon was no exception. He gave him all the status and power and wealth
Hadrian craved, but cursed him with a craving for blood.”
“Damn,” Vivienne whispers. “I always wondered where vampires came from. Not Romania? Not bats then?”
“Certain species did originate from a bat’s bite, yes,” I answer. “There are many iterations of us now due to trade, mixing,
and magic.”
“Right,” Yves agrees. “And while on some level, every vampire originates from Hadrian, we were made directly by the
original vampire, and with that comes strength and ability unmatched by any other.” His eyes roam across his family. “You all
have some of him through me, but all of me is because of him.”
“That’s why you heal quickly when you’re hurt?” Tru asks.
“That’s a trait all vampires share,” Yves explains, “But our abilities are even stronger than most. You can stake us and
we’ll survive.”
“It will hurt though,” I whisper, catching a concerned look from Yves.
“Yes, it should be avoided. We can survive almost anything, and apparently, since Hadrian is alive, two things that can kill
us don’t kill him. Dead blood and fire.”
“That means only decapitation will kill Hadrian.”
“Fuck,” Syn says.
“Which brings us to today.” Yves’s voice hardens. “We don’t know why exactly, but we do know that Hadrian went to great
lengths to keep me and Damiano apart. We know that he has somehow managed to block our awareness of his existence and
each other’s. From what Damiano has learned, we know that Hadrian knows I’m alive, and he’s coming to New Onyx. What
we don’t know is where he’s been all this time, who he has working with him, or how strong he is.”
I nod, adding, “And if what he told us is true, he gets stronger with each new vampire made.”
“So, like, when you made all of us, he got stronger?” Thorn asks.
“Yes. Who knows how many vampires he’s made in the centuries since we parted.”
“Why do you think he wanted you two apart?” Viper asks.
Yves turns to me, searching my eyes. “Because the moment I saw this man, I could no longer devote all my attention to
Hadrian. Passion simmered inside me, but not for my maker.”
“He was jealous?” Vivienne asks.
“He’s jealous still, I imagine,” I answer. “I’m sure he knows we’ve found each other again, and it must be killing him
inside.”
“I hope our names taste like poison on his tongue.”
“Uh, I can make sure that happens,” Vivienne says.
Yves turns to the pretty witch. “Your power is formidable, but I doubt it can stand up against Hadrian.”
She shrugs. “I got a few tricks and secrets of my own. What do you think black magic is for? He’s not the only guy who
knows how to summon help from the underworld.”
I smile. “Yves, your family is amazing.”
“This is wonderful and all,” Eros says, “but how do we know you’re not working with Hadrian?”
I open my mouth to defend myself, but Yves is out of his seat and across the room to Eros. He takes Eros’s hand and presses
it to his chest.
“Answer your own question. Search my heart, brother.”
Eros is still, staring up into Yves’s face for several seconds before he nods. “I understand. My apologies, Damiano.”
“Not necessary. I feel every ounce of love and protection you all have for Yves, and honestly, I am grateful he has you. But I
am the last being in existence who would harm a single hair on this man’s head.”
“There is no need to defend yourself,” Syn says. “If Yves wants you here, we want you here. I’m sure you’re aware of what
we would do to protect him if necessary.”
Yves’s energy is warm and full of love for his family, while quietly accepting their protective spirit.
I nod. “It’s quite palpable. Just so you all know, Yves is not alone in how he felt upon meeting. I was, and still am, willing
to give up everything just to love him. Believing all this time that he was lost to me and finding out that he lives…” My words
trail off as I focus on Yves’s beautiful face. “He lives and thrives and has kept me in his heart all this time, as I have kept him
in mine. For me, it is a second rebirth. He is the reason I accepted Hadrian’s gift. I will do whatever is necessary to keep him.”
Something, an unnamed emotion, ripples between the brothers, hitting Yves square in the chest. He stumbles into me,
gripping my arm. His brow creases as he turns to me.
“Is everything okay?” I ask.
Yves nods, rubbing his sternum. “Yes. They are happy for me.”
 I feel as though something is being intentionally withheld, but it must be for a good reason. He’ll tell me when he’s ready.
A wave of warmth swirls around us, and my breath catches. Yves smiles. “Tomorrow, the hard work begins, but tonight, we
celebrate.”
 TEN

Yves

“Would you mind if I had a moment alone with my brothers?”

Damiano shakes his head. “Of course not.”
“Explore the building. The view from the roof is breathtaking. I’ll find you.” I lean closer, offering a kiss, and he takes it,
lingering as he always did. “We have a lot of kisses to catch up on.”
“Mine are always available to you.” With another peck, he takes off, quickly disappearing down the long hallway that leads
to the stairwell.
I turn to face my brothers, their faces filled with curiosity.
Raphael speaks first, but his expression is flat. “You’re in love with Damiano.”
“I love him, yes, but we’ve been apart for centuries. We need to learn who we are again.”
Syn stands, commanding the room. He’s very clearly speaking for his brothers. “Yves, please forgive our hesitation in
accepting this, but what we went through with Marcello gives us pause with Damiano.”
I tense upon hearing Marcello’s name. “This isn’t the same.” My voice is hard now, tinged with the anger, pain, and
betrayal Marcello left with me. “I didn’t know Marcello. I know Damiano as well as I know myself. Inside, where it matters.”
Thorn glances at Syn, then turns darkened eyes to me. “I don’t think I’m alone in warning you that if he so much as harms a
hair⁠—”
“Do not threaten me, brother, and do not ever, ever threaten Damiano.” Cold air swirls around me, a sign of my rage, and I
blink away the anger that was building. “I do understand your concern, but Damiano is no threat to me. You heard his words,
and do not tell me you don’t feel his energy.”
“We feel it,” Eros says, softly, “but we feel something else too. Something foreboding. Perhaps your love blinds you. We
are here to be your eyes.”
“He would never hurt me,” I insist.
“Maybe he wouldn’t on his own,” Raphael says. “Maybe he’s influenced.”
“No! I refuse to believe it.” I pace for a moment in front of the windows. “I finally found the one man who defined love for
me, and you’re defensive. All of you have looked me in the face and shared your intense desire for me to find the love you
have, yet when it is in my grasp, you deny me?”
“That’s not it,” Syn says. “Not at all. You know this, but none of us ever want to see you torn apart again. We don’t know
Damiano, and frankly, you don’t either. You said so yourself.”
“Almost six hundred years,” Thorn says. “Come on, Yves. That’s a long-ass time.”
I shake my head. “It’s him. The same man…”
“The same man who walked away from you,” Raphael says, drawing my hardened gaze to his face.
“You have no idea what either of us faced with Hadrian. Yes, he left me, and that pain lingers, but I have to believe he was
made to. Hadrian wanted our total devotion and admiration, and when he didn’t have it, he acted. Hadrian has killed people for
less.” I straighten my shoulders. “You may keep your doubts and suspicions, but I expect your support. What we’re going to
face is like nothing you’ve ever even imagined.”
“Of course we support you, Yves,” Syn says. “Each of us wants Damiano to be everything you say he is. Gods, how we
want you to be happy and loved.”
“But Marcello—” Thorn begins, but I spin to face him.
“Do not say that fucking name in the same breath as Damiano’s again. Are we clear?” My brothers nod, clearly shocked at
my outburst. Reason finally pushes through the fog of my emotions. “I know you care, and I appreciate it. Please…” I close my
eyes for a second. “Please continue to be my eyes when I can’t.”
Thorn approaches me first, placing his hand on my chest as he leans in to kiss my cheek. The others follow his lead, and I
accept a kiss on the cheek from each brother, their love and concern for me so thick it’s almost overwhelming.
“I’ll let Hale know to prepare a room at Lair for us,” Thorn says, grinning. “You said so earlier. Tonight we celebrate.”
“I’ll check on Paolo and make sure he’s ready to join us,” Syn offers.
I leave my brothers in a daze, but my feet move as if on air, drawing me closer to my love. I find him on the roof, leaning
over the edge and gazing out over New Onyx. He twists to face me when I join him, a stunning smile on his face.
“You blocked me,” he notes. “I do hope the day comes when you no longer want to.”
“It’s not personal. I just wanted to hear what they had to say privately.”
“In case they hated me?”
I nod. “Other than their mates, my happiness is their priority.”
“You are everything Hadrian wishes he could be. He must be so envious of you.”
“I hope he chokes on his envy.” I take a step closer, lowering my guard.
Damiano tilts his head, a fresh smile tugging at his lips again. “Yves…?”
“Do you remember the seer we visited in Greece?”
Damiano frowns. “Yes. Hadrian was offended by her vision and slashed her face.”
I nod. “He never told us what she said that upset him, but I remember what I hoped it was. That I was not intended to be his
lover, and nor were you. The harem of devoted lovers was not to be, because…”
“Because we were fated for each other?”
I nod. “I believed it once. All those clandestine nights in each other’s arms felt right. More right than I ever felt when
Hadrian touched me.”
“Yes.”
“But then it fell apart. Or maybe it was torn apart. You were gone and I was left with him. I convinced myself that we
couldn’t have been so easily separated if we were intended for each other.”
“Gods, Yves. I went through the same thing. I wondered how fate could be so cruel as to tease me with a love like yours,
then tear it away and tell me it was meant for another.”
Searching his eyes, I nod. “Your return has awakened something in me again. Perhaps it’s hope, but it’s unusual for my
brothers to feel that from me.”
“Feel what, Yves?”
“The connection we share. The intensity of it.”
“And they don’t like it?”
“They want it for me, be assured.”
“Ah, but they are protective. I felt that.”
“Because of…” Even in my thoughts, the name tastes bitter. “Because of what happened in my past. After I met Marcello.”
“I have a feeling I will not like this story.”
“No one does.” I drag my hands down his chest. “But tonight is about us. Our love deserves celebration. The past will
confront us soon enough.”
“Yes. What will we do to celebrate?”
“We’re going to Lair. After all, we’re still celebrating the Festa del Sangue.”
Damiano smiles. “A celebration fitting of us. A feast of flesh and blood. How wonderful that I’m with you.”
I search his eyes for a second, silently pleading with fate to let it be him. Haven’t I waited long enough?
After composing ourselves, we return to the common to find my brothers, their mates, and our two sisters waiting for us.
They continue their conversation without disruption, which pleases me. They are obviously going to try to give Damiano and
me space to figure out what this is between us.
“Drive or fly?” Thorn asks, tossing the SUV keys in the air and grabbing them.
“Drive,” Syn says. “But I’ll be behind the wheel.” He snatches the keys mid-air when Thorn tosses them up again.
Thorn scoffs. “We won’t all fit in one car, dear brother, so I’ll just take the other SUV.”
“As long as my mate isn’t with you,” Syn retorts, pulling Bowie closer.
Bowie laughs softly, patting his mate’s chest. “It’s not like he can hurt me.”
“I don’t like it, just the same.”
Thorn rolls his eyes. “Kyson and I don’t mind a brisk run through the night air. I was trying to show our guest how civilized
we are.”
My eyes flicker to Damiano, who watches the interaction with an amused smile. “Please, do what you would if I weren’t
here.”
“Don’t give Thorn that kind of free rein,” Eros says, and his mate, Justice, giggles. “He does enjoy a bit of exhibitionism.”
A shy smile teases Kyson’s lips as he pushes his glasses up his nose.
“We are vampires,” Damiano says. “The allure of exhibitionism is part of our DNA, is it not?”
Thorn grins like he just found a new best friend. “That’s what I’m always saying. They just suppress theirs.”
 “But have you learned to fly in the centuries since we last met?” Damiano asks.
“That’s just Thorn exaggerating,” Haven says. “I wish we could fly like bats, but really it’s just fast leaping.”
“Ah, that I’m familiar with.”
A surge of heat draws my attention to Midnight and Tru, the two of them chatting with their heads close together. Raphael
stands behind Haven, who’s decked out as if we’re going to Studio 54 back in the day. He leans into Raphael’s touch, his
glittery gold eyelids fluttering.
Damiano must feel it too as he turns his hungry gaze on me. “And you? Where do you fall on the voyeur-slash-exhibitionist
scale?”
“I’d rather show you than tell you.”
Damiano grins. “I’d love that. Show me your world, love.”
Clearing my throat so I don’t literally attack the man, I turn to my brothers, straighten the front of my sport jacket, and nod.
“We’ll ride with Thorn.”
The door to the unit beside mine opens and Paolo steps out. He’s dressed in a midnight-blue suit, his hair slicked back, and
eyes dangerous. Oh, he’s going to be popular at Lair.
“You can ride with us, Paolo,” Syn says.
“Wonderful,” Paolo replies.
We break into two groups—Viv and Viper choosing to come with us while the others follow Syn. Damiano walks so close
our arms brush together, and my soul grows less weary with every slight touch.
Once in the car, Thorn tears off into the night, drawing a joyous giggle from his mate while Viv and Viper gasp.
“Remember, Thorn, we do have two mortals with us,” I say.
“Pshh. I would never hurt our girls. Besides, when have I ever wrecked?”
“I seem to recall several totaled vehicles and startled news reports of the man who walked away without a scratch,” I
answer dryly.
“Oh my gosh, really?” Kyson gushes. “When did this happen?”
“Decades ago,” Thorn answers. “When they first made cars. Not my fault they were so fragile.”
“What about the Lambo?”
Thorn scrunches his nose. “A slight overcorrection on my part.”
“You wrecked a Lamborghini?” Viper asks.
“Wrecked is putting it mildly,” I reply. “He mangled it.”
“Take a corner going one ten and you might lose control of it too,” Thorn says, casually. “I tried to steer out of it, but I
slammed into a warehouse instead.”
Kyson gasps, still giggling behind the hand over his mouth. “Oh, Thorn.”
“Then he steps out of the wreckage completely unscathed,” I continue. “The news reports had a field day.”
“They said I was on coke so my lack of reflexes saved my life,” Thorn says. “Funny because no one did a single medical
test on me. Sounds like they were influenced.”
Kyson giggles again.
“What would they have found if they had done tests?” Viv asks.
“A medical anomaly. I’d still be in a lab somewhere convincing them I’m not actually dead.”
“Happened to me,” Damiano says. “There was a fire at an orphanage. The nuns couldn’t get all the children out in time so I
ran in and saved them. By the time anyone came to help, they were shocked that I’d survived and shielded the remaining
children from harm.” A melancholy smile pulls at his lips. “But I was overcome when a beam fell and broke my neck.”
Viper gasps. “Dear Persephone. You broke your neck?”
Damiano nods. “Yes, and obviously, a vampire can survive it, but you can’t just walk it off.”
I rub his thigh. “Darling…”
“I woke up in a hospital,” Damiano continues. “I wanted to leave, of course, but I was surrounded by medical staff from all
the nearby communities.”
“When did this happen?” Kyson asks.
“Oh, let’s see…early eighteen hundreds. I was in a village in Italy.” He chuckles. “Thank goodness they didn’t have the
technology they do now. Can you imagine an MRI on a vampire?”
Thorn nearly cackles. “Blood work!”
“Even an x-ray,” I add, amused.
“Yes. Today, we’d be considered scientific marvels to be poked and prodded,” Damiano says. “But back then, I might have
been burned at the stake had it not been for my heroic act.”
“How did you get out of it?” Vivienne asks.
“Night fell and they finally suggested I rest. I climbed out the window, descended the building and tore off, never to be seen
again.”
 “You sound sad.” I muse.
Damiano nods. “I was. I enjoyed it there. People left me alone, and we were close enough to a larger city, Rome, where I
could do my hunting.” He squeezes my hand. “I went to Morocco after that. Which turned out to be nice.”
“Morocco is badass, especially back in the day,” Thorn says, turning a corner so sharply the SUV ends up on two wheels,
leaning left, before bouncing back onto the road.
The two witches squeeze each other with closed eyes before laughing it off. Kyson kicks his legs like a happy child, and
Damiano grins through it.
“He’s so much like me when I was younger,” Damiano whispers.
“You’re not like that now?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Perhaps, that wild, free, uninhibited spirit still lives within me, just waiting to feel safe enough to come
out.” He lifts my hand and kisses it. “What do you think?”
“I could use a little lack of inhibitions myself.”
“Lucky for us it’s Blood Festival season,” he says, holding my gaze. “It’s like Mardi Gras for the mortals, no?”
“Good analogy, but things are different in New Onyx. Orderly.”
“Yves runs a tight ship,” Thorn quips.
“How do you keep the vampires under control?” Damiano asks. “In my experience, we’re not a very compliant species.”
I chuckle. “No, we’re not. I only have jurisdiction over my city. The council makes the rules of the club, and I enforce them.
We knew a place like Lair needed to exist, and chose this city because of its proximity to Europe and other places abroad.”
“At Lair, we can play and be ourselves,” Thorn says. “But there are rules.”
“How do you explain it to mortals?”
“Most of the year, Lair lives behind a thick veil thanks to our lovely Vivienne.” She smiles warmly at me. “During Festival,
the veil is slightly lifted and we welcome mortals in more indiscriminately. We offer them a drink to erase many of the more
incriminating details from the night and ensure they get home safely.”
“Brilliant,” Damiano says.
“Nerve-racking,” I reply. “I love the festival. I love the tangible bloodlust in the air. I love the smell of mortal fear mixed
with curiosity and desire.”
“But?” Damiano asks.
“But I fear what could happen if the balance shifts even slightly. Or if a rogue vampire or two refused to follow the rules. It
would be a bloodbath for the mortals and a nightmare for me to clean up.”
“Your brothers help you keep control?”
“Everyone does. The club managers, Hale and Tiago, my sisters with their potions and spells, my brothers.”
“But you carry the weight of the responsibility on your shoulders.”
“It’s my city, Dami. What happens here is my concern.”
“Personally, I think we should unveil the club,” Thorn says, taking another corner too quickly. “Foolish mortals be foolish.
Why shouldn’t we benefit?”
Damiano’s pulse ticks up slightly in response to Thorn’s comment.
“You agree?” I ask.
“With my very limited perception, I believe that we should exist unveiled amongst them.”
“Unveiled?” I ask. “And risk the nonsense of religious groups and curiosity-seekers? Do you know what the scientific
community would do to one of us if they could?”
“Yves, my beautiful man.” Damiano brushes his fingers across my cheeks. “That’s the problem. They don’t know about us,
not really. If we were our true selves, how many of them do you think would fuck with us? The four vampires in this car alone
could destroy the Catholic church in mere minutes. No security, no gun, no group of protestors, and certainly no law could stop
us. If we joined together, even half the world’s vampires could overwhelm every political, religious, and societal structure in
place. I do not fear mortals discovering our existence. I welcome it.”
The air in the car thickens, and I know all too well it’s Thorn’s excitement in having an ally. The jealous part of me checks
along the string of energy between Damiano and my brother, ensuring there is nothing there but innocent agreement.
Damiano grins, leaning close to nuzzle my cheek.
Ah, my beloved. You think for one second any part of me desires anyone other than you?
Chagrined that he senses my ugly emotions, I try to shake them away.
Apologies. Perhaps the past lingers.
For me too, but there is no one but you. Not ever again. I know it’s the same for you.
Nodding, I send the thought, Only you. Gods, to feel you in my head again, in my very soul. What joy.
Time did nothing to fray our connection. May it serve us well.
May it serve us for eternity.
 ELEVEN

Damiano

Thorn pulls off the main street and onto what appears to be a dirt road in a heavily forested area, and I smile as a ripple of
magic washes over me and a large black building appears before us.
Thorn parks the car and we file out, walking as a large group to the entrance. I tilt my head back to take in the entirety of the
structure. It’s made of stone, painted black and lit by lanterns. It looks exactly as it should with a name like Lair.
“You can feel it, can’t you?” Yves asks. “The electricity in the air.”
I nod, gripping his hand in mine as we wait for the other car to arrive. “Sex, blood, magic. If it could be bottled, we’d be
famous.”
Yves chuckles softly. “I’m positive we could bottle it. Vivienne can do anything.”
“How did you find her?”
“She found us. She saw the renovations being made to the House of Orpheus building and stopped by. Given her own
abilities, she immediately knew we were not mortal, and asked to work together. She needed a place to use her skills in
privacy, and she was savvy enough to know that vampires can often benefit from a bit of magic.” He smiles. “Something about
her spoke to me, and in agreement with my brothers, we decided to unite.”
“I detect a bit of melancholy.”
“She doesn’t want to join us on our immortal walk. She fears how it would affect her magic. It saddens me to know we may
lose her someday. Mortals are terribly fragile.”
“Yes, true. She seems young and strong now.”
“She is both those things.”
“And Viper? Are they lovers?”
“Not officially to my knowledge, but I feel the undeniable pull between them. Do you?”
I nod. “I felt it immediately. Again, mortals can be fragile with their hearts as well.”
“Not only mortals.”
I touch his cheek. “True.”
I should tell him what I’ve been through since we parted, what I’ve seen, how I lived, but even though I know he’ll accept
me, a tiny part of me fears disappointing him.
“What is in your heart, Dami?” he asks in that low timbre that still stirs my soul all these years later.
“I will tell you, but not right now.”
“Whenever you are ready.” Yves closes the distance between us, pressing our chests together. I always loved that we had
similar heights, neither of us needing to strain to meet the other’s gaze. “Just know that I accept you wholly.”
“I know.”
Finally, the other car filled with Yves’s coven and guest enters the parking lot. Kyson laughs, whispering to Thorn that he
drives like a race car driver. Thorn wraps his arm around his lover’s waist, kissing him.
Being in the presence of true, fated love is intoxicating. It’s even better than a blood orgy.
Yves, fully aware of my thoughts, grins, leading me to the club entrance as the remaining brothers join us.
As soon as the doormen see Yves, they straighten up and pull the doors open, bowing their heads to him as we pass. He’s
truly royalty in New Onyx, a position he deserves. I always knew he would be a powerful man. Yves was never the type to
blend into the background. He has strong opinions on the world and our place in it, and I’m pleased that attitude persists.
Beyond the big double doors, I’m accosted by the mixture of heady scents. Two servers dressed in nothing but boy shorts
and high heeled boots appear with trays of drinks, offering them to Yves first, then me and Paolo before the rest of the group.
Yves waves them off politely, continuing his walk to an area with black velvet booth seating. The air of the club changes,
clearly reacting to Yves’s presence.
 “Is this what it feels like to be a Mafia boss?” I ask.
“It’s what it feels like to be a god,” Syn answers from beside me. “Yves is far above a street criminal.”
“I meant no offense, Syn.”
“None taken,” he replies with a tight smile. “We have a slight Mafia problem in the area. They are roaches to us. Pesky,
dirty vermin who only cause trouble.”
“We have the same issue,” Paolo says. “They are everywhere.”
“Too bad for them they refuse to stay out of our way,” Thorn quips. “’Cause like roaches, we’re gonna crush ’em.”
“I’ve seen their impact before. They destroyed a village I stayed at in Sicily once. They made it so unsafe, caused so much
death and terror, that survivors chose to abandon their homes. I still regret that I wasn’t there to help. I found out after it was
lost.”
“Like roaches, they are difficult to eradicate,” Paolo says.
“Yet, we will prevail,” Yves says. “If they fuck with New Onyx, they fuck with me.”
“And if they fuck with Yves,” Eros says, “They fuck with all of us.”
“And if that happens,” Raphael adds on, “well, they die.”
“Yeah, that Admiral dude needs to be taken out,” Thorn says as we all take our places around the bench.
Yves is center stage, patting the spot beside him for me. It reminds me of all the times we dreamed of running the world
together, side by side for eternity. He knowingly smiles at me.
“Who is the Admiral?” I ask.
“Big Mafia dude,” Thorn answers. “He’s encroaching a little on our city, but we don’t know how much yet.”
“And we have to be careful,” Raphael says. “Starting a Mafia war is a problem none of us want.”
“I think it’s time we took a more aggressive approach,” Syn says. “But that’s a problem for another day. Tonight is for
celebration.”
A man with a pretty smile but tragic energy approaches, followed by two men carrying trays with pitchers and glasses.
“Welcome, Yves,” the man says before turning to the others. “Brothers.”
“Hale,” Yves says. “My guests, Paolo Malgari and Damiano Honore. Gentlemen, the latest addition to my family, Hale.”
I’m immediately hit with a tinge of jealousy. The affection in Yves’s tone bothers me. Has Hale shared Yves’s bed too?
Yves tilts his head at me before shaking it.
“Hale came to us through tragedy,” Yves explains. “But fate knew he belonged with us.”
Hale nods, stepping to the side as the servers set the drinks out. “Yves and his brothers saved my life. I am eternally
humbled and thankful to be part of his family.”
“We are equally thankful,” Yves says. “Paolo is with the council.”
“Ah, welcome,” Hale says.
“Thank you,” Paolo says.
“Are you with the council too, Damiano?” Hale asks.
“No,” I answer. “I knew Yves…a very long time ago.”
“Damiano is number two, Hale.”
Hale’s clear eyes widen. “An honor then,” he says, bowing his head slightly.
“Thank you, but please treat me as you would anyone.”
I turn to Paolo, who has his head tilted back, sniffing the air. His fangs are out, eyes glowing.
“I’ve heard about Lair,” he says. “But words don’t do it justice.”
Thorn chuckles. “You have no idea.”
“I’m happy to give you a tour,” Hale offers. “There are many delights during Festival.”
Paolo is on his feet instantly. “Lead the way.”
After the two men leave, I cozy in closer to Yves. “Tragedy clings to Hale.”
Yves nods. “Yes, sadly. He’s wounded but healing. We found him close to death and orphaned from his coven.”
“Why?”
“Someone attacked his coven and his mortal lover. I sense something in him though, something worth holding on to. That’s
why I asked him to join my family.”
“Not your bed though?”
Yves smiles, shaking his head. “No, darling.”
I huff a laugh. “I’m being ridiculous. We’ve been apart for centuries, so I shouldn’t feel an ounce of jealousy toward anyone
who has touched you, and yet I’m nearly drowning in it. As polyamorous as I’ve been in the past, that doesn’t extend to you.
Your brothers, as you call them, are unusually attractive men. Why wouldn’t you have made them your lovers? But gods, it turns
my stomach to think of it.”
“Then don’t think of it. It was so long ago, Dami. The bond with my brothers is deep and eternal, but it is not romantic.”
“I know. I feel it. As I said, I’m being ridiculous.”
 “Is it wrong that I find your jealousy a bit sexy?” Yves grins, his fangs brushing his bottom lip. “I haven’t been wanted like
this since…” He shakes his head as his words trail off. “Since I was last with you.”
“That’s right, Yves. No one has ever wanted you the way I do. No one ever will.” I brush my fingers under his chin. “By the
gods, you are beautiful when your beast is out.”
“I wish it always could be. That’s why Lair is so important. We need a place to be ourselves, let our beasts stretch out.”
“But do you truly indulge? I sense that you don’t.”
He shakes his head again, glancing around the space. “No. I have to be aware. Besides, no one has caught my eye in so
long. The most I do is occasionally feed.”
“And even that is rare,” Thorn says. “You know what would be amazing though, my guy? If you took Yves’s mind off things
for a few hours and left it to us.”
“I want you all to have fun,” Yves says.
“If I may,” Kyson says. “We always have fun. It’s your turn.”
“Respectfully agree,” Vivienne says.
“Yep, hard agree,” Viper adds.
“Sounds like we have a request on the table,” I say to Yves. “Why don’t you give me a tour of the club? All is well and
safe.”
A flutter of emotions, from hesitation to excitement, flit across his face before he nods. “I’d love to show you around.”
“Yessss!” Thorn says, high-fiving his lover. “You made this, Yves. Enjoy it. Feast.”
Yves’s pretty hazel eyes settle on my face. “Shall we feast?”
“Gods, yes.”
Yves slides out of the booth, extending his hand to me. I take it, letting him guide me. As we pass, the crowd parts to give
us ample space. Yves is clearly used to this treatment, but for me it’s a marvel. How different my life could have been if I’d
had access to a place like Lair.
We walk down a dark hallway, lit only with candle-like lanterns until we reach a stairwell.
“These lead to the rooftop deck,” Yves explains, taking the first step. “It’s…an experience up there. Follow me.”
“Wherever you go, Yves.”
He graces me with a relaxed smile. “Ah, Dami, you might just melt the walls of ice around my heart.”
“I plan to. And keep calling me Dami. There’s no sweeter sound.”
Yves presses against me, kissing me hard before releasing me and continuing the climb up the stairs. As we near the top, the
energy shifts, and the air becomes thicker with the scent of lust and blood. When we reach the top step, two smallish men
dressed in black masks and fishnet bodysuits, their cocks covered with tiny briefs, scramble to part the velvet curtains for
Yves.
I’m hit with a tsunami of hedonism that causes me to stumble backward. Yves chuckles.
“Yes, it’s a lot.” He inhales. “Up here, I essentially ignore whatever happens. The rules are that the vampires are
responsible for any messes made, including drained mortals.”
“Gods,” I whisper as I’m hit with wave after wave of sexual thrall. “It’s intense.”
“Even more during Festival.” He stretches his arms out. “Feel it, Dami. Soak in it. Is there anything better than a vampire’s
lust?”
“No.” I move behind him, brushing my lips on his neck. “How do you avoid it?”
“What?”
“The temptation of it all? Especially being who you are.” We walk past a sofa piled with writhing bodies, then an armchair
with a mortal man lying across the lap of a vampire, the latter gorging himself on the former’s blood. “You could have anyone
you want.”
“Yes.” We pause near the end of the deck and lean against the railing. “Perhaps I couldn’t let go enough, and I’ve learned to
feed on the energy of it all.”
“In my mind’s eye, I see you in the middle of it all, on your golden throne, beautiful men and women at your feet, desperate
for your attention, a slight smile, a hit of your thrall. They would worship your body, every inch, and willingly open their veins
for you. Yet, you resist such indulgence. I’ve always known you are a stronger man than me.”
Yves chuckles. “My brokenness and fetish for control don’t equate to strength.”
I close the space between us, pressing our chests together as I search his eyes. “Let me be your salve, Yves. I want to fix
anything still broken.”
Yves reaches up, brushing his fingers across my cheek. “My love, I believe you already have.”
 TWELVE

Yves

Desire crackles around me like electricity. I can’t remember the last time I felt so…myself. My old self.
“There’s another space I want to show you.”
Damiano nods, flicking his tongue out to wet his lips. Somehow, he’s even more beautiful than he was. More perfect,
more…everything.
“Show me.”
I push off the wall, putting a bit of distance between us, even though that’s the last thing I want. I chuckle, and Damiano
does too, obviously aware of my thoughts.
“Who is your favorite?” he asks as we walk on. “I bet I can guess.”
“I don’t have a favorite. I love my brothers equally.”
“No, you don’t,” he challenges. “Or perhaps you love them equally, but some hold different parts of your heart.”
“No.”
“Syn is special because he’s the first. You loved him the most,” Damiano guesses.
Memories flood my mind. “I wanted to love him. Outside of you and Hadrian, no one else captured my attention the way he
did at that time. Something inside him called to me. I couldn’t deny it.”
“Where did you meet him?”
“Italy. He was the son of a wealthy Florentine banker. He was bored out of his mind and so deliciously queer. It didn’t take
much to lure him away from his perfectly constructed life.”
“It must have been a rush to take him.”
“Ours was a tumultuous beginning. I didn’t know how to be anyone’s maker, let alone a lover for more than a night or two.
Syn—Alessio, as he was called then—was headstrong, but so loyal and dedicated to me. I became who I am in large part due
to the challenges he gave me.”
I smile, pausing to remove a key from my pocket and unlock a door. As we step into the dark space, my eyes adjust and I
lead us up a second staircase.
“Thorn,” he says. “Your connection is different from the others.”
“Thorn is my free bird. A rare, exotic creature who allows his cage simply to please me.” Yves chuckles. “We were
disastrously incompatible as lovers, but he was a perfect choice for my family. I believe he was born to be a vampire. He’s so
suited for it.”
“But without your guidance, he would self-destruct?”
I glance over my shoulder, smiling. “Most definitely.” I open a door, revealing a smaller private deck, high above the one
we just left. “How’s this for a view?”
“Incredible.” Damiano leans on the railing and looks over, then out again at the skyline. “Your private lair?”
I nod. “Unused. Tiago had it made for me, but I never feel compelled to come up. Just once or twice when I want silence.”
“I’m honored.” He walks to an emerald-green velvet sofa under an awning but on a platform where the view is still visible.
“Midnight. He’s dark. Is that where his name comes from?”
I chuckle. “Yes. He’s not as dark as he seems, and his spirit brightens the more he enjoys his mate.”
“What drew you to him?”
“He was a slave, basically. I had caught his scent in the market and hunted him down, essentially buying him away from the
scum who thought owning people for his own whims was acceptable. Syn was equally compelled, so we offered him a new
home.”
Damiano sits on the couch, smiling as I join him. “A wealthy heir, a slave, a wild one. Who’s next?”
“Thorn was last, but after Midnight was my poet, Eros. You’ll love the scandal. He was a cousin to the crown of England.”
 “A prince?”
Yves nods. “An ethereal prince with a heart for written words of love. Hence his chosen name.”
“How on earth did you claim him?”
“A well planted rumor. It was said I could heal anyone, and poor Henry suffered. Unfortunately, his father and mother
learned of their son’s early demise, but he lives.”
“Brilliant. And Raphael?”
“The artist. He was a prisoner in Spain. Got caught fucking the king’s son.”
I snort a laugh. “You bailed him out?”
“I did. I adored his defiant spirit, but how easily he submitted to me and his brothers.”
“Is he really an artist?”
“Oh yes. I have many of his paintings. His given name is actually Raphael. We didn’t change it.” A wistful smile plays on
my lips. “My family is everything I hoped for. I chose Syn to leave something behind if anything happened to me. He is the
legacy. Midnight is the thinker. Eros, the poet, Raphael, the artist, and Thorn, the hedonist.”
“And you are the creator of it all.”
“I am the beginning. The Maker.”
“You are their savior, Father.”
I chuckle. “I suppose I am.” I drag my hand down his chest. “But am I yours?”
“Thousands of years ago you rescued my soul from the devil himself. Whether we were foolish to defy Hadrian, I don’t
know or care. All that matters is that he led me to you. And it’s you, Yves, and my memories of a tragically beautiful Cillian,
that have saved me a million times since we parted. Even though part of me believed you might be lost to eternity, I held on to
my miserable existence just in case I ever found you again.”
I climb onto his lap, draping my arms around his neck. “And you did. Do you remember what I would say to you every time
we made love?”
“All the gods, I do.”
“Say it.”
“Fuck me, Enzo,” he whispers. “Fuck me so well no one exists but us.” My body tingles as the words leave his lips. They
seem to bounce between us, taking us back hundreds of years to a more perfect time, before Hadrian tried to destroy
everything.
“So fuck me, Dami. Fuck me so well no one exists but us.”
“Now? Please say yes.”
I grin. “Definitely now.”
Damiano flips me onto my back, grinning at my surprised laughter while I work on getting his trousers open. His cock
breaks free, already hard and dripping. Inhaling his scent, I moan as I work on getting my own pants open.
“It’s just like it was,” I whisper. “Those clandestine moments, rushed and desperate, while he was away hunting.”
“He always knew about us.” Damiano tugs my pants off, freeing my cock. “I hope he still feels us. Still knows our love
persists. Still knows he lost.”
Damiano slides his fingers between my legs, moaning at the softness waiting for him. It’s only been a few hours since we
last fucked, but I definitely haven’t had my fill yet. Clearly, neither has Dami.
I open my legs to him, propping one up on the back of the sofa and reaching down to stroke my erection. “But now you’re
gonna make us forget for a little while.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, sending my request downstairs, and the air around us turns fuzzy for a few seconds until the door
opens and a server appears with a tray. He glances at Damiano, averting his eyes from our nudity as he silently sets down a
pitcher of fresh blood and darts off.
“Who was that?”
I wiggle underneath him. “A compliant worker who can hear me.”
“How?”
“How do you think, lover?”
“You fed him your blood.”
“Once upon a time.”
“You fucked him?” His voice is tense.
I cannot hold back my grin. “Ooh, there’s my green-eyed beast again. Maybe I should fuck that out of you.” I feel a shiver of
desire rip through him.
“Maybe you should.”
“The blood is for you, Dami. I know how you love to feed and fuck.”
“I prefer a live meal,” he answers, knocking our cocks together.
I hiss with pleasure. “Baby steps.”
 “This brazen hedonism is rare for you, but you still trust me enough to let go a little.”
I nod as my throat tightens with emotion. “It’s been centuries.”
Reaching down, Damiano dips his fingers in the warmed blood and lets them drip across my torso. “Gods, you are even
more stunning draped in mortal blood.”
“I am your desire, Dami. Your food, your flesh, your dreams. Do to me whatever you want. I happily submit.”
“Yves…” His eyelids flutter. “Don’t play with me.”
“I’m not, lover. I’m just going to lie here and be a… What does Thorn call it? A pillow princess?”
Damiano snorts a laugh. “You won’t demand a thing?”
“Within reason.”
Still chuckling, Dami lifts the pitcher from the tray on the ground and pours a steady stream of warm liquid from my chest to
my cock. Our breathing is audible, as is his quickened heartbeat. The scent of his arousal mixed with the blood is almost too
much for me.
Then Damiano scoots down enough to suck my cock into his mouth, moaning around it as precum and blood mix on his
tongue.
I watch with hooded eyes as he expertly sucks me. Then I lift the pitcher and pour more blood between us, allowing
Damiano to lap it up while enjoying the feel of his tongue on my skin.
“It’s so sweet,” he murmurs, slurping a pool off my belly. “So good.”
I drag my fingers through the little puddle on my chest, then suck them clean. “Mmm. Not as good as yours, but it’ll do.”
“You are dangerous, lover. You could undo me.”
“I will always put you back together again.”
“I know.”
I pour more blood between us that Dami drinks up in between sucking my cock and biting my thighs. His thoughts are
chaotic. There are so many things he wants to do with me, he’s overstimulated.
“Shh, lover,” I whisper, stroking his hair. “We have time for all of it.”
He nods, blinking the haze out of his eyes. “Right.”
Gripping my ankle, Dami rubs his cock against my hole, moaning loudly at the soft pull of my body, like a magnet attracted
to its mate. As he slides inside me, a sound that is nothing but pure sex bubbles out of me, and his cock releases another stream
of precum in response.
“I swear to every god you were made for me,” Dami whispers. “It’s the only way it could be this perfect.”
I part my lips in invitation and Damiano takes it, falling forward and tasting my kiss as he does his best to fuck me the way
he innately knows I want and need.
I dig my sharp nails into his shoulders, lifting my hips to meet each punishing thrust Damiano gives. Not very passive
pillow princess of me, but I don’t give a fuck. It’s what I need.
What we both need.
Somehow, in the flurry of intense fucking, I manage to splash more blood between us. Damiano hungrily licks it off every
bit of skin he can reach, and my orgasm builds quickly as I rub the life essence into my chest.
I’m hit with one of Damiano’s memories, so I shake my head to stop it, sending a thought.
Only us.
Damiano nods, refocusing on my wrecked hole while I inhale his scent and marvel at his incredible face. Damiano bites
into my calf, and the sensation pushes me over the edge. His cock pulses inside me, and we come together, writhing in each
other’s arms.
Damiano collapses in my embrace, still thrusting inside me. He feels so good I wish it would never stop, but eventually he
pulls out to worship my body with his tongue, licking up every drop of blood and cum spilled between us.
I watch him intently, my lips parted with thoughts I don’t know how to put into words.
“Do I please you still, my beloved?” Damiano asks, his tone dripping with concern and insecurity. That won’t do.
I nod, finally clearing my throat. “I was just…stunned, I guess. It’s been a long time…” I shake my head with a soft chuckle.
“Actually, it’s only been you who knows just how to unravel me. Only you who pushes back the noise in my head. Only you
who can make me let go like that. It hit me hard.”
“Your words give me life, Yves. I live for your happiness. All I want for the rest of this eternal walk is to be next to you,
and to spend every ounce of energy I have on making you feel as loved as you are.”
“You’re my safe place, Dami.”
He brushes his fingers across my cheek. “And you are my everything.”
 THIRTEEN

Damiano

A few hours later, after enjoying the solitude of Yves’s private deck, we head back to the main floor where a lot is happening. I
spot Thorn and his mate dancing, with Raphael and Haven close to them. Syn and Bowie sit at our table, the two of them
chatting and kissing between words. Eros and Justice are at the bar talking to Hale and another man. I don’t see Midnight or his
mate or the two witches.
“Midnight is in a back room,” Yves explains. “He’s not into publicly showing off his mate sexually.”
“The jealous type?”
“Ever since he met Tru.”
“And the witches?”
Yves tilts his head slightly. “Kitchen. Making more potion, I think.”
“And your guest? Paolo. What of him?”
Yves shakes his head. “No idea. I have no natural connection to him.”
“He’s in the rope room,” Syn says as soon as we sit at the table. “Apparently, our friend has a taste for bondage.”
“To each their own,” Yves replies before turning to me. “Do you want a drink?”
“I haven’t had enough yet?”
Yves chuckles. “I meant a regular cocktail. Tiago has a recipe that I’d swear was from the gods themselves.”
“How can I resist that?”
In a flash, a little demon twink appears beside Yves, gazing up at him like he hung the moon. “What can I get you, Master?”
Yves cups the demon’s chin affectionately. “Now, Willow, I’ve told you to call me Yves. I’m not your master.”
Willow twists his full pink lips, his eyes flashing from emerald-green to white to black as he smiles at Yves. From a
distance he could blend in with any crowd of mortals, especially behind a bit of glamor, but I imagine he enjoys the freedom to
be himself inside the club.
“Sorry. Mmm, how about Mr. Orpheus?”
Yves laughs, warming my chest with the sound. “Not a single soul calls me Mr. Orpheus.” Pulling his hand away, he
glances at me. “Call me what you like, Willow. We’d love two house cocktails.”
Willow turns his strange gaze on me, and I’m hit with a wave of sex pheromones. Incubus. He smiles, baring sharp white
teeth.
“You’re new.” He sniffs. “But you smell like Master.”
“That’s because I belong to him, little incubus. And he belongs to me, so send your energy elsewhere.”
Willow giggles. “No worries, handsome vampire. I know when my wiles are not received.” He bounces off to the bar.
Yves leans into my arm. “Willow is harmless. He loves to get people all horny and then sit back and watch the orgies that
break out.”
I chuckle. “He seems fun. So demons are allowed here?”
Yves shrugs. “Sure. Any supe is as long as they behave.”
“Amazing.”
We take our seats and Willow returns a few minutes later with our drinks. He stands and watches with an expectant
expression while Yves sips his. Yves raises an eyebrow.
“We don’t need your help, cupid.”
Willow titters with laughter. “But it’s so fun. You’re so happy, Master. I couldn’t help myself.”
Yves smiles. “Thank you.”
Willow waves as he leaves us.
“Did he put something in the drink?” I ask.
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 Fig. 128.—Terra-cotta statuette.
Actual size. British Museum.
Drawn by Saint-Elme Gautier.
It may be thought, perhaps with truth, that the sculptor has
overdone these details, and that his figures are, in some degree,
sacrificed to the decorations about them. Other examples from the
same series, give a higher idea of the sculpture of this time; we may
cite especially a fragment possessed by the Louvre, in which the
treatment is of the skilfullest (Plate X). It represents Assurbanipal in
his war-chariot at the head of his army. The chariot itself, and all the
accessories, such as the umbrella and the robes of the king and his
attendants, are treated with great care but they do not unduly attract
the eye of the spectator. We can enjoy, as a whole, the group formed
by the figures in the chariot, and those who march beside and
behind it. Its arrangement is clear and well balanced; there is no
crowding, the spacing of the figures is well judged and the
movement natural and suggestive. The king dominates the
composition as he should, and his umbrella happily gathers the lines
of the whole into a pyramid. In all this there is both knowledge and
taste.
 The best of the Assyrian terra-cottas also belong to this period.
The merit of their execution may be gathered from the annexed
statuette, which comes from the palace of Assurbanipal (Fig. 128).
From the staff in its hands it has been supposed to represent a king,
but we know that every Assyrian was in the habit of carrying a stick
with a more or less richly ornamented head, and here we find neither
a tiara nor the kind of necklace which the sovereign generally wore
(see Fig. 116). I am inclined to think it is the image of a priest.
In conclusion we may say that, in some respects, Assyrian
sculpture was in a state of progression when the fall of Nineveh
came to arrest its development and to destroy the hopes it inspired.

§ 7.—Polychromy.

We have now studied Mesopotamian sculpture in its favourite

themes, in its principal conventions, and in the fluctuations of its
taste and methods of work; we have yet to ask whether this
sculpture, which differed in so many ways from the plastic art of
Egypt, differed from it also in absence of colour. We have put off this
question until now, because we had first to determine what materials
the architect and sculptor employed, how they employed them, and
what part was played by figures in relief and in the round in the
architectonic creations of Chaldæa and Assyria.
In speaking of Egypt we have explained how a brilliant light
destroys the apparent modelling of objects, how, by the reflections it
casts into the shadows, it interferes with our power to distinguish one
distant plane from another.[273] In every country where a vertical sun
shines in an unclouded sky, the decorator has had to invoke the help
of colour against the violence of the light, has had to accept its aid in
strengthening his contours, and in making his figures and ornaments
stand out against their ground. In describing Egyptian polychromy
we said that we should find the same tendency among other nations,
different in character and origin, but subjected to the influence of
similar surroundings. We also allowed it to be seen that we should
have to notice many changes of fashion in this employment of
colour. Colour played a different and more important part in one
place or period than in another, and it is not always easy to specify
the causes of the difference. In the Egyptian monuments hardly a
square inch of surface can be found over which the painter has not
drawn his brush; elsewhere, in Greece for instance, we shall find him
more discreet, and his artificial tints restricted to certain well-defined
parts of a figure or building.
Did Assyria follow the teaching of Egypt, or did she strike out a
line of her own, and set an example of the reserve that was
afterwards to find favour in Greece? That is the question to be
answered. Before we can do so we must produce and compare the
evidence brought forward by Botta, Layard, Place and others, who
saw the Assyrian sculptures reappear in the light of day. Ever since
those sculptures were recovered they have been exposed to the air;
they have undergone all the handling and rubbing involved in a
voyage to Europe; and for the last twenty or thirty years they have
been subjected to the dampness of our climate. We need, then, feel
no surprise that traces of colour still visible when the pick-axe of the
explorer freed the alabaster slabs from their envelope of earth have
now disappeared.
Before examining our chief witnesses, the men who dug up
Khorsabad, and Nimroud, and Kouyundjik, we may, to some extent,
foretell their answers. We have already explained how the
Mesopotamian architect made use of colour to mask the poverty of
his construction and to furnish the great bare walls of his clay
buildings. Both inside and outside, the Assyrian palaces had the
upper parts of their walls and the archivolts of their doors decorated
with enamelled bricks or paintings in distemper. Is it to be supposed
that where the reliefs began all artificial tinting left off, and that the
eye had nothing but the dull grey of gypsum and limestone to
wander to from the rich dyes of the carpets with which the floors
were strewn? Nothing could well be more disagreeable than such a
contrast. In our own day, and over the whole of the vast continent
that stretches from China to Asia Minor, there is not a stuff, however
humble, that is woven on the loom or embroidered by the needle, but
betrays an instinctive feeling for harmony so true and subtle that
every artist wonders at it, and the most tasteful of our art workmen
despair of reaching its perfection, and yet many of these faultless
harmonies were conceived and realized in the tent of the nomad
shepherd. We can hardly believe that in the palace where official art
lavished all its resources in honour of its master, there could be any
part from which the gaiety that colour gives was entirely excluded,
especially if it was exactly the part to which the eye of every visitor
would be most surely attracted.
Before going into the question of evidence one might, therefore,
make up our minds that the Assyrian architect never allowed any
such element of failure to be introduced into his work; and the
excavations have made that conclusion certain. The Assyrian reliefs
were coloured, but they were not coloured all over like those of
Egypt; the grain of the stone did not disappear, from one end of the
frieze to the other, under a layer of painted stucco. Flandin, the
draughtsman attached to the expedition of M. Botta, alone speaks of
a coat of ochre spread over the bed of the relief and over the nude
portions of the figures;[274] he confesses, however, that the traces
were very slight and that they occurred only on a slab here and
there. Botta, who saw the same slabs, thought his colleague
mistaken.[275] Place is no less decided: “None of us,” he says, “could
find any traces of paint upon the undraped portions of the figures,
and it would be very extraordinary if among so many bare arms and
bare legs, to say nothing of faces, not one should have retained any
vestige of colour if they had all once been painted.”[276] We might be
inclined to ask whether the traces of pigment that have been noticed
here and there upon the alabaster might not have been the remains
of a more widespread coloration, the rest of which had disappeared.
Strong in his experience, Place thus answers any doubts that might
be expressed on this point: “We never found an ornament, a
weapon, a shoe or sandal, partially coloured; they were either
coloured all over or left bare, while objects in close proximity were
without any hue but their own. Sometimes eyes and eyebrows were
painted, while hair and beard were left untouched; sometimes the
tiara with which a figure was crowned or the fan it carried in its hand
was painted while the hand itself and the hair that curled about the
head showed not the slightest trace of such an operation; elsewhere
colour was only to be found on a baldrick, on sandals, or the fringes
of a robe.” Wherever these colours existed at all they were so fresh
and brilliant at the time of discovery that no one thought of explaining
their absence from certain parts of the work by the destruction of the
pigment. “How is it,” continues Place, “that, if robes were painted all
over, we only found colour on certain accessories, on fringes and
embroideries? How is it that if the winged bulls were coated in paint
from head to foot, not one of the deep grooves in their curled beards
and hair has preserved the slightest vestige of colour, while the white
and black of their eyes, which are salient rather than hollowed,
remain intact? Finally, we may mention the following purely
accidental, and therefore all the more significant, fact: a smudge of
black paint, some two feet long, was still clearly visible on the breast
of one of the colossi in the doorway of room 19.[277] How can we
account for the persistence of this smudge, which must have fallen
upon the monster’s breast while they were painting its hair, if we are
to suppose that the whole of its body was covered with a tint which
has disappeared and left no sign?”
Such evidence is decisive. The colouring of the Assyrian reliefs
must always have been partial. The sculptor employed the painter
merely to give a few strokes of the brush which, by the frankness
and vivacity of their accent, should bring the frieze into harmony with
the wall that enframed it. Nothing more was required to destroy the
dull monotony of the long band of stone. At the same time these
touches of colour helped to draw attention to certain details upon
which the sculptor wished to insist.
For all this, four colours were enough. Observers agree in saying
that black, white, red and blue made up the whole palette.[278] These
tints were everywhere employed pretty much in the same fashion.
[279]

In those figures in which drapery covered all but the head, the
latter was, of course, more important than ever. The artist therefore
set himself to work to increase its effect as much as he could. He
painted the eyeball white, the pupil and iris, the eyebrows, the hair
and the beard, black; sometimes the edges of the eyelids were
defined with the same colour. The band about the head of the king or
vizier is often coloured red, as well as the rosettes which in other
figures sometimes decorate the royal tiara. The same tint is used
upon fringes, baldricks, sandals, earrings, parasols and fly-flappers,
sceptres, the harness of horses and the ornamental studs or bosses
with which it was covered, and the points of weapons.[280] In some
instances blue is substituted for red in these details. Place speaks of
a fragment lost in the Tigris on which the colours were more brilliant
than usual; upon it the king held a fan of peacock’s feathers coloured
with the brightest mineral blue.[281]
When figures held a flower in their hands it was blue, and at
Khorsabad a bird on the wing was covered with the same tint.[282] In
some bas-reliefs red and blue alternate in the sandals of the figures
and harness of the horses.[283] We find a red bow with a blue quiver.
[284] The flames of towns taken and set on fire by the Assyrians were

coloured red in many of the Khorsabad reliefs.[285]

A few traces of colour may still be discovered upon some of
Sargon’s sculptures in the Louvre and upon those of Assurnazirpal in
the British Museum.[286] I could find no remains of colour either upon
the reliefs of Assurbanipal or upon those of Sennacherib, where,
moreover, Layard tells us he could discover none.[287]
It would be very strange however, if in these palaces of the last of
the Sargonids the decorator had deliberately renounced the beauties
of that discreet system of polychromy of which the traces are to be
found in all the earlier palaces. It is possible that these touches of
colour were reserved for the last when the palaces were erected,
and that something may have happened to prevent them from being
placed on the sculptures of these two sovereigns.
So far as we can discover, no trace of colour has been found on
any of the arched steles or isolated statues left to us by Chaldæa
and Assyria. This abstention is to be explained by the nature of the
materials at the disposal of the sculptor in Chaldæa, the cradle of his
art. These were chiefly igneous rocks, very hard, very close in grain
and dark in colour, and susceptible of a very high polish. The
existence of such a polish disposes of any idea that the figures to
which it was given were ever painted. The pigment would not have
stayed long on such a surface, and besides, the reds and blues
known to the Ninevite artists would have had a very poor effect on a
blue-black ground.
On the other hand, when they set to work to model in clay the
Assyrians could give free rein to their love for colour. Most of the
statuettes found in the ruins of their palaces had been covered with a
single uniform tint, which, thanks to the porous nature of the
material, is still in fair preservation. The tint varies between one
figure and another, and, as they are mostly figures of gods or
demons, the idea has been suggested that their colours are
emblematic.[288] Thus the Louvre possesses a statuette from
Khorsabad representing a god crowned with a double-horned tiara,
and covered all over, flesh and drapery alike, with an azure blue.[289]
A demon with the head of a carnivorous animal, from the same
place, is painted black, a colour that seems to suggest a malevolent
being walking in the night and dwelling in subterranean regions.[290]
The Assyrians also made use of what has been sometimes called
natural polychromy, that is to say they introduced different materials
into the composition of a single figure, each having a colour of its
own and being used to suggest a similar tint in the object
represented. Several fragments of this kind may be seen in the
cases of the British Museum.[291] We may give as examples some
eyes in black marble; the ball itself is ivory while the pupil and iris are
of blue paste, a sandy frit in which the colour sank deeply before
firing. Beards and hair were also made of this material; they have
been found in several instances, without the heads to which they
belonged. In the ruins from which he took these objects, Layard saw
arms, legs and torsos of wood. They were so completely carbonized
by fire that they could not be removed; at the least touch they
crumbled into powder.
With wood, with enamel and coloured earths, with stones, both
soft and hard, and metals both common, like bronze, and precious,
like gold and silver, the sculptor built up statues and statuettes in
which the peculiar beauty to be attained by the juxtaposition of such
heterogeneous materials, was steadily kept in view. With inferior
taste and less feeling for purity of form than the Greeks, this art was
identical in principal with the chryselephantine sculpture that created
the Olympian Zeus and the Athene of the Parthenon.
The idea that sculpture is the art in which form is treated to the
exclusion of colour is quite a modern one.[292] The sculptor of
Assyria was as ready to mix colour with his contours as his confrère
of Egypt, but he made use of it in more sober and reserved fashion.
How are we to explain the difference? It is easier to prove the fact
than to give a reason for it. It may be said that the sunlight is less
constant and less blinding in Mesopotamia than in the Nile valley,
and that the artist was not called upon to struggle with such
determination, by the profusion and brightness of his colours, against
the devouring illumination that impoverishes outlines and obliterates
modelling. We must also bear in mind the habits formed by work in
such materials as basalt and diorite, which did not lend themselves
kindly to the use of bright colours.
In any case the fact itself seems incontestable. We cannot say of
the Ninevite reliefs as we said of those of Thebes, that they
resembled a brilliant tapestry stretched over the flat wall-surfaces. If,
in most of the buildings, touches of paint freely placed upon the
accessories and even upon the figures and faces, lightened and
varied the general appearance of the sculptures, still the naked
stone was left to show all over the bed and over the greater part of
the figures. From this we must not conclude, however, that the
Assyrians and Chaldæans did not possess, and possess in a very
high degree, the love for bold and brilliant colour-schemes which
even now distinguishes their degenerate posterity, the races
inhabiting the Euphrates valley and the plateau of Iran. But they
gratified their innate and hereditary taste in a different way. It was to
their woven stuffs, to their paintings in distemper and their enamelled
faïence that the buildings of Mesopotamia owed that gaiety of
appearance which has led us to compare them with the mosques of
Turkey and Persia.
 § 8.—Gems.

“Every Babylonian had a seal,” says Herodotus;[293] this fact

seems to have struck him directly he began to explore the streets
and bazaars of the great oriental city. These seals, which appear to
have attracted the eye of the historian by the open manner in which
they were carried and the continual use made of them in every
transaction of life, public or private, are now in our museums. They
are to be found in hundreds in all the galleries and private collections
of Europe.[294]
When Chaldæan civilization became sufficiently advanced for
writing to be in widespread use and for every man to provide himself
with his own personal seal, no great search for convenient materials
was necessary. The rounded pebbles of the river beds gave all that
was wanted. The instinct for personal adornment is one of the
earliest felt by mankind, and just as the children of to-day search in
the shingle of a beach for stones more attractive than the rest, either
by their bright colours, or vivid markings or transparency of paste, so
also did the fathers of civilization. And when they had found such
stones they drilled holes through them and made them into earrings,
necklaces and bracelets. More than one set of pebble ornaments
has been preserved for us in the Chaldæan tombs. In many
instances forms sketched out by the accidents of nature have been
carried to completion by the hand of man (Fig. 129). They were not
long contented with thus turning a pebble into a jewel. The fancy
took them to engrave designs or figures upon them so as to give a
peculiar value to the single stone or to sets strung into a necklace,
which thus became a kind of amulet (Fig. 130).
In the first instance this engraving was nothing more than an
ornament. But one day it occurred to some possessor of such a
stone to take an impression upon plastic clay. Those who saw the
image thus obtained were struck by its precision, and were soon led
to make use of it for authenticating acts and transactions of every
kind. The presence of such an impression upon a document would
perpetuate the memory of the man who put it there, and would be
equivalent to what we call a sign manual.
 But even when it developed into a seal the engraved stone did
not lose its talismanic value. In order to preserve its quasi-magic
character, nothing more was required than the presence of a god
among the figures engraved upon it. By carrying upon his person the
image of the deity in which he placed his confidence, the Chaldæan
covered himself with his protection as with a shield, and something
of the same virtue passed into the impressions which the seal could
produce in such infinite numbers.
 Fig. 129.—River pebble
which has formed part of a
necklace.

Fig. 130.—River pebble engraved; from De

Gobineau.
No subject occurs more often on the cylinders than the celestial
gods triumphing over demons. Such an image when impressed upon
the soft clay would preserve sealed-up treasures from attempts
inspired by the infernal powers, and would interest the gods in the
maintenance of any contract to which it might be appended.[295]
To all this we must add that superstitions, of which traces subsist
in the East to this day, ascribed magic power to certain stones.
Hematite, for instance, as its name suggests, was supposed to stop
bleeding, while even the Greeks believed that a carnelian gave
courage to any one who wore it on his finger.
When engraving on hard stone was first attempted, it was, then,
less for the love of art than for the profit to be won by the magic
virtues and mysterious affinities, both of the material itself, and of the
image cut in its substance. Then, with the increase of material
comfort, and the development of social relations, came the desire of
every Chaldæan to possess a seal of his own, a signet that should
distinguish him from his contemporaries and be his own peculiar
property, the permanent symbol of his own person and will. So far as
we can tell, none but the lowest classes were without their seals;
these latter when they were parties or witnesses to a contract, were
contented with impressing their fingernails on the soft clay. Such
marks may be found on more than one terra-cotta document; they
answer to the cross with which our own uneducated classes supply
the place of a signature.
When the use of the seal became general, efforts were made to
add to its convenience. In order to get a good impression it was
necessary that the design should be cut on a fairly even and regular
surface. The river pebbles were mostly ovoid in form and could
easily be made cylindrical by friction, and the latter shape at last
became so universal that these little objects are always known as
cylinders. These cylinders were long neglected, but within the last
few years they have been the subject of some curious researches.
[296] They may be studied from two different points of view. We may
either give our attention to the inscriptions cut upon them and to their
general historical significance, or we may endeavour to learn what
they may have to teach as to the religious myths and beliefs of
Chaldæa. As for us we are interested in them chiefly as works of art.
It will be our duty to give some idea of the artistic value of the figures
they bear, and to describe the process by which the engraving was
carried out.
The cylinders are, as a rule, from two to three-fifths of an inch in
diameter, and from three quarters of an inch to an inch and a half in
length. Some are as much as an inch and three quarters, or even
two inches long, but they are quite exceptional.[297] The two ends
are always quite plain—the engraving is confined to the convex
surface. As a rule the latter is parallel to the axis, but in some cases
it is hollowed in such a fashion that the diameter of the cylinder is
greater at the ends than in the middle (Fig. 131).
Nearly every cylinder is pierced lengthwise, a narrow hole going
right through it. Those that have been found without this hole are so
very few in number that we may look upon them as unfinished. In
some cases the hole has been commenced at both ends, but the drill
has stopped short of the centre, which still remains solid.

Fig. 131.—Concave-faced
cylinder; from Soldi.

Fig. 132.—Cylinder with modern

mount; from Rawlinson.
The cylinders were suspended by these holes, but how? In
casting about for an answer to this question, the idea that the
Babylonian attached the greatest importance to the clear
reproduction, in the clay, of every detail of the design engraved upon
his seal, has been taken as a starting point, and a system of
mounting invented for him which would leave nothing to be desired
in that respect (see Fig. 132). It is a reproduction, in small, of a
garden roller; as a restoration, however, it can hardly be justified by
the evidence of the monuments. Examine the terra-cotta tablets on
which these seals were used, and you will see that their ancient
possessors did not, as a rule, attempt to impress the whole of the
scenes cut in them upon the soft clay. It is rare to find an impression
as sharp and complete as that on the tablet from Kouyundjik, which
we borrow from Layard (Fig. 133). In the great majority of cases
signatories were content with using only one side of their seals,
usually the side on which their names were engraved. Sometimes
when they wished to transfer the whole of their cylinder to the clay,
they did so by several partial and successive pressures.[298]
The imperfect stamp with which the Chaldæans were satisfied
could easily be produced without the help of such a complicated
contrivance as that shown in our Fig. 132. Nothing more was
necessary than to lay the cylinder upon the soft clay and press it with
the thumb and fore-finger. The hole through its centre was used not
to receive an armature upon which it might turn, but merely for
suspending it to some part of the dress or person. In most cases it
must have been hung by a simple cord passed round the neck. Now
and then, however, the remains of a metal mount have been found in
place, but this is never shaped like that shown above. It is a bronze
stem solidly attached to the cylinder, and with a ring at its upper
extremity (Fig. 134).[299] Cylinders are also found with a kind of ring
at one end cut in the material itself (Fig. 135).
How were these cylinders carried? They must have been
attached to the person or dress, both for the sake of the protecting
the image with which most of them were engraved, and for
convenience and readiness in use as seals. In Chaldæa the fashion
seems to have been, at one time, to fasten them to the wrist. In
those tombs at Warka and Mugheir that we have described, the
cylinders were found on the floors of the tomb-chambers, close to
the wrist-bones of the skeletons; and the latter had not been moved
since the bodies to which they had belonged were laid in the grave.
[300] This fashion was apparently abandoned by the Assyrians, for in
those reliefs which reproduce the smallest details of dress and
ornament with such elaboration, we can never find any trace of the
seal beside the bracelets. It is probable that it was hung round the
neck and put inside the dress, in front, for greater security. It never
occurs among the emblematic objects of which the necklace that
spreads over the chest outside the robe, is made up. To this day
traders in the East keep their seals in a little bag which they carry in
an inside pocket.
Fig. 133.—Tablet with impression from a
cylinder; from Layard.
Fig. 134.—Cylinder with ancient
bronze mount; from Soldi.

Fig. 135.—Cylinder and

attachment in one; from Soldi.
 Fig. 136.—Chaldæan cylinder;
from Ménant.

Fig. 137.—Impression from the same cylinder.

The practical requirements of the Mesopotamians were satisfied
with a hasty impression from their seals, but we must be more
difficult to please. Before we can study the cylinder with any
completeness we must have an impression in which no detail of the
intaglio is omitted; such a proof is to be obtained by a complete turn
of the cylinder upon some very plastic material, such as modelling-
wax, or fine and carefully mixed plaster-of-Paris. The operation
requires considerable skill. When it is well performed it results in a
minute bas-relief, a flat projection, in reverse, of the whole intaglio.
The subject represented and its execution can be much better seen
in a proof like this than on the original object, it is therefore by the
help of such impressions that cylinders are always studied; we make
use of them throughout this work. Our Figs. 136 and 137 give some
idea of the change in appearance between a cylinder and its
impression.
The cutting on the cylinders, or rather on all the engraved stones
of western Asia, is in intaglio. This is the earliest form of engraving
upon pietra-dura in every country; the cameo is always a much later
production; it is only to be found in the last stage of development,
when tools and processes have been carried to perfection. It is much
easier to scratch the stone and then to add with the point some
definition to the figure thus obtained, than to cut away the greater
part of the surface and leave the design in relief. The latter process
would have been especially difficult when the inscriptions borne by
many of the seals came to be dealt with. What long and painful
labour it would have required to thus detach the slender lines of the
cuneiform characters from the ground! And why should any attempt
of the kind be made? As soon as these engraved stones began to be
used as seals, there was every reason why the ancient process
should be retained. The designs and characters impressed upon
deeds and other writings were clearer and more legible in relief than
in intaglio. And it must be remembered that with the exception of
some late bricks on which letters are raised by wooden stamps, the
wedges were always hollowed out. We find but one period in the
history of Chaldæa when, as under the early dynasties of Egypt, her
written characters were chiselled in relief. It is, then, apparent that
the artists of Chaldæa would have done violence to their own
convictions and departed from long established habits, had they
deserted intaglio for work in relief. That they did not do so, even
when their skill was at its highest point, need cause us no surprise.
The Chaldæans naturally began with the softest materials, such
as wood, bone, and the shells picked up on the shores of the
Persian Gulf. Fragments of some large pearl oysters and of the
Tridacna squamosa, on which flowers, leaves, and horses have
been engraved with the point, have been brought from lower
Chaldæa to London (see Fig. 138).[301] Limestone, black, white, and
veined marble, and the steatite of which most of the cylinders are
made, were not much more difficult. These substances may easily
be cut with a sharp flint, or with metal tools either pointed or chisel-
shaped. With a little more effort and patience still harder materials,
such as porphyry and basalt; or the ferruginous marbles—
serpentine, syenite, hematite—could be overcome. The oldest
cylinders of all, those that are attributed to the first Chaldæan
monarchy, are mostly of these stubborn materials; their execution
was easy enough to the men who produced the statues of Gudea.
[302] All that such men required to pass from the carving of life-size
figures to the cutting of gems was good eyesight and smaller tools.
It was only towards the end of this period that more unkindly
stones began to be used, such as jasper and the different kinds of
agate, onyx, chalcedony, rock-crystal, garnets, &c. The employment
of such materials implies that of the characteristic processes of gem-
cutting, whose peculiarity consists in the substitution of friction for
cutting, in the supercession of a pointed or edged tool by a powder
taken from a substance harder, or at least as hard, as the one to be
operated upon. “The modern engraver upon precious stones,” says
M. Soldi, “sets about his work in this fashion. He begins by building
up a wax model of his proposed design upon slate. He then takes
the stone to be engraved, and fixes it in the end of a small wooden
staff. This done he makes use, for the actual engraving, of a kind of
lathe, consisting of a small steel wheel which is set in motion by a
large cast-iron flywheel turned by the foot. To the little wheel are
attached small tools of soft iron, some ending in a rounded button,
others in a cutting edge. The craftsman holds the staff with the stone
in his left hand; he brings it into contact with the instrument in the
lathe, while, from time to time, he drops a mixture of olive oil and
diamond dust upon it with his right hand; with the help of this powder
the instrument grinds out all the required hollows one after the
other.”[303]