A Discovery of Witches - Deborah Harkness [167]
“Yes.” My mind raced at the implications. Ysabeau was going to chase down a rabbit, kill it, and drink its blood in front of me? Staying far away seemed an excellent suggestion.
Matthew’s mother darted across the grassy field, moving so fast it was impossible to keep her in focus. She slowed just as a falcon does in midair before it swoops in for the kill, then bent and grabbed a frightened rabbit by the ears. Ysabeau held it up triumphantly before sinking her teeth directly into its heart.
Rabbits may be small, but they are surprisingly bloody if you bite into them while they’re still alive. It was horrifying. Ysabeau sucked the blood out of the animal, which quickly ceased struggling, then wiped her mouth clean on its fur and tossed its carcass into the grass. Three seconds later she was swinging herself back into the saddle. Her cheeks were slightly flushed, and her eyes sparkled more than usual. Once mounted, she looked at me.
“Well?” she asked. “Shall we look for something more filling, or do you need to return to the house?”
Ysabeau de Clermont was testing me.
“After you,” I said grimly, touching Rakasa’s flank with my heel.
The remainder of our ride was measured not by the movement of the sun, which was still hidden behind clouds, but by the increasing amounts of blood Ysabeau’s hungry mouth drew from her kills. She was a relatively neat eater. Still, it would be some time before I was happy at the prospect of a large steak.
I was numb to the sight of blood after the rabbit, the enormous squirrel-like creature that Ysabeau told me was a marmot, the fox, and the wild goat—or so I thought. When Ysabeau gave chase to a young doe, however, something prickled inside me.
“Ysabeau,” I protested. “You can’t still be hungry. Leave it.”
“What? The goddess of the hunt objects to my pursuit of her deer?” Her voice mocked, but her eyes were curious.
“Yes,” I said promptly.
“I object to your hunting of my son. See what good that has done.” Ysabeau swung down from her horse.
My fingers itched to intervene, and it was all I could do to stay out of Ysabeau’s way while she stalked her prey. After each kill, her eyes revealed that she wasn’t completely in command of her emotions—or her actions.
The doe tried to escape. It almost succeeded by darting into some underbrush, but Ysabeau frightened the animal back into the open. After that, fatigue put the doe at a disadvantage. The chase touched off something visceral within me. Ysabeau killed swiftly, and the doe didn’t suffer, but I had to bite my lip to keep from shouting.
“There,” she said with satisfaction, returning to Fiddat. “We can go back to Sept-Tours.”
Wordlessly I turned Rakasa’s head in the direction of the château.
Ysabeau grabbed my horse’s reins. There were tiny drops of blood on her cream shirt. “Do you think vampires are beautiful now? Do you still think it would be easy to live with my son, knowing that he must kill to survive?”
It was difficult for me to put “Matthew” and “killing” in the same sentence. Were I to kiss him one day, when he was just returned from hunting, there might still be the taste of blood on his lips. And days like the one I was now spending with Ysabeau would be regular occurrences.
“If you’re trying to frighten me away from your son, Ysabeau, you failed,” I said resolutely. “You’re going to have to do better than this.”
“Marthe said this would not be enough to make you reconsider,” she confessed.
“She was right.” My voice was curt. “Is the trial over? Can we go home now?”
We rode toward the trees in silence. Once we were within the forest’s leafy green confines, Ysabeau turned to me. “Do you understand why you must not question Matthew when he tells you to do something?”
I sighed. “School is over for the day.”
“Do you think our dining habits are the only