turns around and tugs her close. "You're warm."
"I'm at normal body temperature." But when Olivia's forehead nuzzles the crook of her neck, Julienne's pulse leaps. She pushes her mind away from the thought of that day in that hotel room on that bed. A tactile memory. "Are you feeling better?"
"I will be." Olivia sighs into Julienne's collarbone. "Did your lovers ever tell you that you're without compare?"
Elena said only that she cleaned up well. They communicated in English since Elena speaks maybe two sentences of Gwongdongwa, and that phrase always bothered Julienne. The Australian liked her to look good when they were together in public, and that meant twenty minutes picking out an outfit Elena would approve, twenty more piling on the makeup that had to look natural and elegant. Elena despised eyeliner too thick, eyeshadow too vivid—tawdry she called them, no class. "They weren't liars."
"You mean that they were boors. I've met demons who could seduce monarchs to their deaths. To me they are nothing. But you."
"What kind of compliment is that?"
"For a year you forgot me. I remembered."
She doesn't speak after that, subsiding into something not quite like rest. When they are up and moving again Olivia's eyes are brilliant, clear. She marches tireless and rigid.
The second time Olivia falls, she tells Julienne to stay away.
"You can't even stand on your own," Julienne says.
"I haven't eaten." Olivia's panting races shallow and fast. "I haven't eaten and my belly believes it's been starved for decades. You smell like strength and passion, and every wonderful and delicious thing that ever was. I slowed my heart and my blood to stem my hunger. It wasn't enough."
Fear palpitates in Julienne's wrists and punctures that bubble of invulnerability. Standing there over Olivia's heaving shoulders she asks herself what is she doing there, what was she thinking, this is insane. She isn't in a story and she has no place in one—a legend, a narrative in which only those larger than life like Olivia and Bak Seijuen can possibly be real, be true.
Julienne puts her arms around Olivia. "You promised you wouldn't feed from me again."
"When I said that, I wasn't famished." Olivia's voice is thread. "I don't know what I will do."
As before, Olivia is light. Lighter. No weight to her at all, no substance. "I'm holding you to your promise."
* * *
Time trickles. In this state Xiaoqing can think only in smells and sharp jabbing pains. She knows the rough direction—the closer she gets the surer she becomes—but she can barely push forward the mass of her own body. Her human skin is breaking. When the layer of this form has been flayed away heaven will eat through her true self, corrosive poison.
When she can concentrate, she detaches from the frame of her sinews and arteries, floating free in the coils of her memory. But flesh pulls her back and the hunger would return in howling waves. It claws at her, and tells her that there is food, that it is sweet and full of youth and life. Hunger becomes all she knows, all she can think of, eclipsing both the idea and the eminent actuality of Bai Suzhen.
She loses count of the precipice-moments where she almost opens her jaw wide and seizes the human in her fangs; for all her feebleness Xiaoqing is still predator, and Julienne only prey. It wouldn't be a feeding of simple power. It would be a rending of throat and breast, where she sinks her teeth deep and finds the treasure of pancreas and liver, the gorgeous sensation of innards sliding down her gullet.
Not this mortal. Not Julienne. Julienne who is practically carrying her now, who holds her upright, who trusts Xiaoqing blindly.
Unconsciousness interrupts her, and when she jolts alert Julienne is loosening her collar. "No." Her voice unravels.
"You need to breathe." Julienne's fingers fumble and falter, pinching a button. "Oh."
"Stop. You don't need to see the rest."
"I've already seen the rest," the mortal snaps,
"I'm at normal body temperature." But when Olivia's forehead nuzzles the crook of her neck, Julienne's pulse leaps. She pushes her mind away from the thought of that day in that hotel room on that bed. A tactile memory. "Are you feeling better?"
"I will be." Olivia sighs into Julienne's collarbone. "Did your lovers ever tell you that you're without compare?"
Elena said only that she cleaned up well. They communicated in English since Elena speaks maybe two sentences of Gwongdongwa, and that phrase always bothered Julienne. The Australian liked her to look good when they were together in public, and that meant twenty minutes picking out an outfit Elena would approve, twenty more piling on the makeup that had to look natural and elegant. Elena despised eyeliner too thick, eyeshadow too vivid—tawdry she called them, no class. "They weren't liars."
"You mean that they were boors. I've met demons who could seduce monarchs to their deaths. To me they are nothing. But you."
"What kind of compliment is that?"
"For a year you forgot me. I remembered."
She doesn't speak after that, subsiding into something not quite like rest. When they are up and moving again Olivia's eyes are brilliant, clear. She marches tireless and rigid.
The second time Olivia falls, she tells Julienne to stay away.
"You can't even stand on your own," Julienne says.
"I haven't eaten." Olivia's panting races shallow and fast. "I haven't eaten and my belly believes it's been starved for decades. You smell like strength and passion, and every wonderful and delicious thing that ever was. I slowed my heart and my blood to stem my hunger. It wasn't enough."
Fear palpitates in Julienne's wrists and punctures that bubble of invulnerability. Standing there over Olivia's heaving shoulders she asks herself what is she doing there, what was she thinking, this is insane. She isn't in a story and she has no place in one—a legend, a narrative in which only those larger than life like Olivia and Bak Seijuen can possibly be real, be true.
Julienne puts her arms around Olivia. "You promised you wouldn't feed from me again."
"When I said that, I wasn't famished." Olivia's voice is thread. "I don't know what I will do."
As before, Olivia is light. Lighter. No weight to her at all, no substance. "I'm holding you to your promise."
* * *
Time trickles. In this state Xiaoqing can think only in smells and sharp jabbing pains. She knows the rough direction—the closer she gets the surer she becomes—but she can barely push forward the mass of her own body. Her human skin is breaking. When the layer of this form has been flayed away heaven will eat through her true self, corrosive poison.
When she can concentrate, she detaches from the frame of her sinews and arteries, floating free in the coils of her memory. But flesh pulls her back and the hunger would return in howling waves. It claws at her, and tells her that there is food, that it is sweet and full of youth and life. Hunger becomes all she knows, all she can think of, eclipsing both the idea and the eminent actuality of Bai Suzhen.
She loses count of the precipice-moments where she almost opens her jaw wide and seizes the human in her fangs; for all her feebleness Xiaoqing is still predator, and Julienne only prey. It wouldn't be a feeding of simple power. It would be a rending of throat and breast, where she sinks her teeth deep and finds the treasure of pancreas and liver, the gorgeous sensation of innards sliding down her gullet.
Not this mortal. Not Julienne. Julienne who is practically carrying her now, who holds her upright, who trusts Xiaoqing blindly.
Unconsciousness interrupts her, and when she jolts alert Julienne is loosening her collar. "No." Her voice unravels.
"You need to breathe." Julienne's fingers fumble and falter, pinching a button. "Oh."
"Stop. You don't need to see the rest."
"I've already seen the rest," the mortal snaps,
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