Chapter 9

"Why would you help me?" I asked. Seraphina sat on the guard's stool, crossing her legs. "Because he's not sleeping. He wakes up snarling your name. He broke three of my guards' arms yesterday for mentioning you." Her eyes glittered. "A dead lover is a closed chapter. But a lover he killed with his own hands? That's a ghost. And I don't share my bed with ghosts." "So you want me alive." "I want you gone." She pulled a vial from her coat. Dark red. "Vampire venom. Enough stops a heart cold. Ninety...