Free The Angel Stone: A Novel by Juliet Dark Page A

when I was urging my students not to?
    “It will be my pleasure to escort Professor McFay home.”
    The voice, silky and urbane, came from the shadows beneath a nearby pine tree. A tall man-shaped figure detached itself and glided forward. It wasn’t a man, though; it was Anton Volkov, Eastern European Studies professor and vampire.
    “Mr. Stewart.” He acknowledged Mac with a nod and a slight quiver of his long patrician nose. Mac tended to smell like chewing tobacco and hay. “Miss Ballard, I enjoyed your paper on
The Master and Margarita
. Such an original take on the devil.” And then, turning his glittering eyes on me, he bowed. His blond hair looked silver in the moonlight. “Professor McFay, I’ve missed your company at our security meetings.”
    “I’ve been b-busy with my classes,” I stammered.
    “Of course. But there are some matters that have come up that you should be aware of. I can catch you up on the walk to your house. Mr. Stewart and Ms. Ballard are right that you shouldn’t walk alone after dark. You never know who—or what—may be lurking in the shadows.”
    Like you
, I thought. But he was right that I needed to know what was going on. Giving Mac and Nicky a brave smile, I joined Volkov on the path leading off campus.
    “You’ve been avoiding me,” he said as soon as we were out of earshot of Nicky and Mac.
    “No! I’ve been busy with the semester start-up and … a research project. I’m trying to find another door to Faerie.”
    I hoped that mentioning the door to Faerie would distract him and change the subject, but he remained quiet; his face, when I glanced over at him, was as impassive as that of a marble statue. We were walking on the path to the southeast gate, a heavily wooded and isolated spot where I’d once been attacked by a giant winged creature. I shivered at the memory.
    Quick as a bird’s wings, Volkov’s jacket was off and around my shoulders. The silk lining was cool, holding no hint of warmth from its previous wearer, but it soon made me feel warm.
    “Okay,” I admitted as we reached the gate. “I have been avoiding you. I haven’t forgotten our deal.” Volkov had given me the name of the witch who had cursed Nicky Ballard’s family, and he’d told me he would ask a favor in return. I’d been afraid he would ask for my blood, but he had only requested that I speak to the Grove on behalf of the nocturnals. Then the Grove had turned on Fairwick and I hadn’t been able to carry out my end of the bargain. “I know I still owe you … a favor.”
    Volkov stopped past the gate and laid an icy hand on my arm to halt me. Once before he had used his touch to paralyze me, but I didn’t feel unable to move this time, just
unwilling
, held by the magnetism of his gaze. “That’s why you’ve been avoiding me?” he asked, his eyes holding mine. “Because you think I will ask for payment in some other kind?” He stroked a finger along my throat, from the base of my jaw to the rise of my clavicle. Although his skin was cold, his touch stirred a sensation of warmth under my skin, as if the blood in my veins were attracted by it, as if my blood were magneticallydrawn to him. He’d said to me once that he would never demand anything of me that I didn’t desire, but, if he sensed my desire, would he take what he wanted without asking?
    “I know with the supply of Aelvesgold dwindling in this world, you must be …” I tried to think of a polite way of saying
hungry
, but he finished the sentence for me even more alarmingly.
    “Starving?”
    I nodded.
    He smiled. “It’s true that when my ancestors were banished from Faerie and cursed to drink the blood of the creatures we loved best, some of us tried to use Aelvesgold to stanch our hunger, but we have learned other ways to control our appetites over the centuries. Other creatures are not so … well equipped with alternatives. That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. We’ve been finding animals in