“Let’s pretend I believe that this is possible,” he said. Tenzin barked something in Mandarin, but he just waved a hand in her direction and continued looking at Stephen. “I’ll pretend this is possible, and you tell me why on earth an immortal vampire like Lorenzo wants this elixir enough to start a war with me.”

“I told you, it’s not just for humans.”

Beatrice’s eyes were darting around the table. She was as skeptical as Giovanni, but she knew her father had never been easily fooled, and he looked dead serious.

“I’d like to know why you think this is plausible, Dad.” She spoke quietly, but every head at the table swung toward her. She had forgotten about her food almost as soon as it was set in front of her, but she played with her chopsticks nervously. “I mean, from all accounts, alchemists have tried for thousands of years to create a magic formula to prolong life, but none of them ever accomplished it.”

Tenzin finally spoke. “But, none of them—as far as we know—had the advantage that Geber had.”

“And what was that?” Giovanni leaned back in his chair as he spoke.

Stephen said, “Four vampires willing to work with him.”

All attention was on her father again.

“What?” Giovanni narrowed his eyes, glaring at Stephen.

“Geber had four vampires, one of each element, that he was working with. I finally figured it out by reading one of his journals in Andros’s library. It’s one of the other books I took. I took the manuscript with the formula, along with three of Geber’s journals and a few books I knew I would be able to sell for quick cash.”

“Some of my collection.”

He offered Giovanni an embarrassed frown. “I’m sorry. I’m sure some of them were yours, but I had nothing.”

“I’ll get them back. Continue.”

“The key to the elixir is the blood. No one knows why we have an affinity toward the elements, but all vampires do. And it’s our blood that seems to hold the key. Geber was smart and probably knew that his contemporaries would doubt his use of blood that wasn’t even supposed to exist—except in myth—so he never names the ingredients in the formula, but from reading his journals, I was finally able to figure it out.”

“But why would that even—”

Stephen turned to Beatrice. “You have bruises all over, why can’t Giovanni heal them?”

She frowned. Surely her father knew that much. “Because I’m human. Gio says my digestive system would break down his blood before it could have any positive effect. That’s why it only works on open cuts or scrapes.”

“Exactly, your human system doesn’t know what to do with it. Whatever magic animates our blood—”

“It’s not magic,” Giovanni spit out. “We just haven’t figured out what it is yet.”

“Damn it!” Tenzin said. “You’re so damn arrogant, Gio. Do you think your science can explain everything? There are things in this world—”

“That haven’t been explained yet. And once upon a time, humans didn’t know what the stars were, either. But that time has passed. The mysteries of the natural world—”

“Are not going to be revealed at this table,” Beatrice interrupted. “But the super-secret mystery of the elixir of life might be if you all quit arguing and let my dad talk.”

Stephen chuckled, but Giovanni and Tenzin looked annoyed to have been interrupted. Still, they fell silent and Giovanni gestured to Stephen. “Continue.”

Her father turned to Tenzin. “If you were injured, would you go to another wind vampire for blood?”

“You know I wouldn’t.” She seemed content to play along with the rhetorical question. “I would go to a vampire of another element that I trusted if I needed strength. The blood of your own  element—”

“Does very little to heal, unless it is your own sire,” Giovanni said, a sudden light of interest coming to his eyes. “It is the combination of elements that seems to heal. Tell me about the four types of blood.”

Stephen took a deep breath. “Geber must have researched extensively, and his subjects must have been very open with him. What he discovered was that, combined, the four elemental bloods would create an elixir that would heal and prolong human life. Possibly indefinitely.”

“Oh, wow,” Beatrice whispered. “So—”

“How?” Giovanni asked. “How would a human even be able to ingest it?”

Tenzin spoke softly. “That’s where his alchemy came in, my boy. It seems that somehow, Geber was able to stabilize it. That’s what the formula is for. It’s the formula to stabilize the four combined immortal bloods in a way that will allow the human body to reap the benefits in the same way that a vampire body does.”

“But…”

She could tell from looking at him that Giovanni had been rocked. She was feeling a little overwhelmed herself. He looked at her and traced a hand along her cheek, letting his thumb rest at the pulse in her neck.

“Beatrice,” he whispered. “This could be…”

“Gio, we don’t know enough about this.”

Tenzin spoke up again. “No, we most definitely do not. And I’m highly suspicious of the next part of the findings.”

“What findings?” Beatrice asked.

“Geber tested it for almost a year,” Stephen said, “and the results seemed very promising. He gave it to a human that was diseased—he only described it as a ‘wasting disease’—but the recovery was almost instant. The human was observed for another few months before Geber sent him home, apparently totally healed. Another subject was very elderly. While the elixir didn’t reverse the aging process, it seemed to halt when he took the blood, and his quality of life improved. He was healthier and exhibited a ‘younger’ level of health.