The morning traffic hummed outside the glass panes, muffled by the heavy velvet drapes I kept drawn against the glare. I did not move away from him, though every nerve in my spine prickled with the warning of a trap sprung too easily. Levin held my gaze without blinking, his long green hair catching a stray beam of sunlight that had slipped past the awning. He smelled of rain-soaked loam and crushed fern fronds, a scent that had no business lingering in a dusty city storefront. My hand remained on the rough wooden counter, pressing down until the grain bit into my palm.
“What do you really know about me?” I asked, keeping my voice low enough that it barely carried past the rows of potted ferns.
Levin tilted his head, a gesture so casual it felt almost insulting given the weight of the crown I hid beneath my hair. “I know you sit on a throne of black basalt when the sun goes down, Your Majesty,” he said, letting the title drop between us like a weighted coin. “And I know you spend your nights trying to fix what your predecessors broke by turning blood into something that doesn't require a pulse to keep.”
The breath caught in my chest, a sudden, sharp constriction that had nothing to do with magic and everything to do with naked exposure. Nobody outside the deep vaults of the subterranean court knew the scope of my alchemy, let alone an itinerant elf who traded in rare stems. I glanced toward the back curtain where Hunter usually stood, but the shadows there were completely empty. Levin reached into the leather pouch at his belt and pulled out a small, stoppered vial filled with a shimmering, pearl-tinted liquid that pulsed in time with my own racing pulse.
“I can tell who is a vampire the moment I smell the ash on them,” Levin said, his tone dropping into something flat and serious. “And I have the gift to put anything into blood. I can even make it endless.”
A low, rumbling laugh echoed from the corner near the sacks of potting soil, sending a chill down my spine. Hunter materialized from the dimness, his tall frame folding out of the shadows with his tailored black coat rustling softly. He looked at Levin, then at me, and shook his head with a dry, humorless sound that lacked any real amusement. “Well,” Hunter muttered, crossing his arms over his chest. “That saves us the trouble of hunting down every rogue alchemist in the province.”
“Be quiet, Hunter,” I snapped, though my eyes remained locked on Levin’s unreadable face. The court lords had spent the last century trying to purge our kind of any reliance on human lives, executing anyone who suggested a synthetic alternative was possible. They had no idea what they were trying to get rid of, completely blind to the fact that this elf standing in my shop was the only one who could fully stop their hunger. They called my experiments a weakness, a sentimental flaw that would eventually cost me the crown. If Cassian or any of the other northern lords discovered what Levin could do, they would tear this shop down to the foundations to control him.
“You’re taking a massive risk walking in here and admitting that,” I said, stepping closer until the warmth of his body radiated against mine through the tether. “The court would skin you alive just to harvest your hands.”
“Then it’s a good thing I came to you instead,” Levin replied, his voice softening as he held out the pearl vial. “I don't want a bounty. I just want a place to stay.”
I looked at the vial in his hand, then at the heavy brass lock on the door leading to my private quarters. The sensible part of my mind, the cold, ruthless part that ordered executions without blinking, told me to throw him out into the alley and lock the shutters forever. But the invisible cord humming in my chest pulled me forward, an undeniable gravity that defied every law I had spent centuries enforcing. If I let him stay, I was compromising the absolute impartiality required of a queen. If I turned him away, I might be sealing the doom of every vampire starving in the dark tunnels beneath the city.
“Come with me,” I said, turning sharply on my heel and pushing past the bead curtain that led to the back room. The back workspace smelled of dried sage, sulfur, and the metallic tang of the monster blood vats bubbling near the back wall. Hunter didn't follow us, staying out in the shop to flip the front sign to closed with a sharp metallic clack. I heard Levin’s soft footsteps following right behind me, his boots clicking against the flagstone floor like falling raindrops.