This is the story I'm working on while biding my time until the rerelease of All Hallows Blood. A preview of it, anyway. The plot changed a bit when I started, so this scene is changing up a bit too.
Still, enjoy a bit of vampire feeding, and meeting characters Alexi and Rook.
***
I grunted when they threw me forward, too off-balanced to round on my captors before they slammed the door. “You’d better run, motherfuckers.” My threat had no weight, but the words came free anyway.
The stone cell gave no clues as to the identity of my kidnappers. Strong, silent, and supernatural, three men had snagged me out of my bed and thrown me into a generic prison. I wasn’t far from home, but that didn’t narrow my location in any way.
Determined to escape, I began moving around. Soft gaslights burned on a few walls, making gloom of pure darkness, yet leaving many deep shadows. Walls and floor were clean and bare, with one rickety stool and table in the very center. Everything was clean, untouched, except the lingering scent of blood.
Thick blood, dark and powerful. Not human. The blood demon stirred along the base of my spine.
“Rook, is that you?” I recognized the groaning voice, and turned to the farthest corner of the cell. “Of course they’d bring you here.” A broken laugh followed the comment.
“Alexi?” Incredulous, I approached. The vampire had never sounded to hurt, so defeated. I hadn’t seen him in a few days; had he been here the whole time? “Are you all right?”
“Stay back.” Alexi’s warning was sharp, his voice deeper than normal.
The vehemence brought a fresh wave of blood scent, communicating much information about his condition. The vampire was wounded, hungry, and in poor shape. What had these unknown creeps done to my friend? “Come into the light. Let me see you.” I’d never feared the vampire, but I currently feared for him.
Clothes rustled as Alexi shifted. “Rook, you can’t be here. You have to get out. Call the Clan. Summon your demon. Do something, anything, but get out.” His voice trembled with weakness and pain, and I waited patiently for him to appear.
The pained scent of his blood grew stronger, began to worry me. I needed to lighten the mood before I got too worried. “What’s so bad, my batling? It’s not like either of us are unfamiliar with kidnapping. Just wait for the ransom, and we’ll get out.”
“It’s not kidnapping. It’s torture.” Alexi exited the shadows.
He was a shambling mess. Disheveled, bloody, dirty, Alexi barely resembled himself. In two years of friendship, I’d yet to see him appear less than immaculate. Black hair hung lank around hollow cheeks, dirt and blood smeared over pale skin. Clothes were tattered, loose around his frame, and a wound oozed thick blood from his side.
“What have they done to you?” My brows drew together in concern, and I took several steps forward. “Who are they? Why would they do this?”
Alexi leaned against the wall, hanging his head. “Old enemies dredging up long-forgotten transgressions using ancient tortures. Beaten and drained, the vampire is locked in a room with the one he cares about. The damage eventually drives him into a frenzy, and he completely devours his…” Alexi paused, raising those fabulous green eyes to meet mine. “Devours his love.”
I flushed, lost in his gaze. My heart raced as I remembered all the flirting, all the intimacy that we’d so casually shared. “Your love?” For two years, I’d crushed on my best friend, but I’d never let him know, never thought he felt anything for me.
Alexi nodded slowly. “Yes, Rook. I don’t know how they found out, but I don’t want you to suffer. I need you to not suffer, to get out. Please, escape me.”
I shook my head, striding toward the vampire. “Like fuck I will. Especially after that bombshell.” Determination filled me, steadied my thoughts and movements.
The vampire shuddered, though he kept his eyes locked on me. “Coming closer is risky.” Pain and lust warred within his voice. “It’s already been too long since I last fed.” He groaned, eyes rolling closed.
When he spoke again, his voice was a tortured whisper. “I can smell you so strongly. I want to finally taste you. But-” He hissed, writhed, and scrunched his eyes. “I won’t be able to stop once the frenzy begins.”
“Answer seems pretty obvious,” I told him. The vampire’s eyes slowly opened, and I held his trembling gaze. Pulling my hair back from my neck, I smiled shyly. “My batling should feed before he frenzies.”
He shuddered violently and pressed further into the wall. “Rook, no. You can’t mean it.” Despite the trepidation in his words, Alexi couldn’t tear his gaze from my neck.
“Of course I mean it.” The blood demon stirred hard, raising my body heat. Staring at the vampire, I closed the distance and opened the lacings of my sleeping shift. “I’ve flirted and played with you in hopes you’d push my invitation.”
His stare intensified, and my pulse quickened. “You desire my bite? Even knowing the risk of enthrallment?”
“Curiosity outweighs danger, yeah.” Ten feet separated us when I stopped, resting my hands on my hips. “Now, are you going to come feed or not?”
Alexi leaned forward, then took a hesitant step forward. “Why offer yourself now?”
I swallowed hard, suddenly shy. “If you take my blood now, while in control, you can stop yourself. You’ll have the strength to get us both out, and don’t have to lose your...love.”
Some of his normal confidence returned, and he ran a hand through his hair. “You have faith in my control?”
I nodded, tipping my head to one side. “And I have my blood demon. One way or the other, you’ll not take my life.”
Alexi nodded once and closed his eyes. “Ever logical, my darling Rook. You find the solution I could not see, that I should have seen.” The vampire opened near-luminescent green eyes, and my heart froze in my chest. “I shall attempt to be gentle.”
The vampire’s presence surrounded me like a thousand icy hands, stroking and gripping me. I trembled, quaked, filled with need. His hunger pulled and tore at my spirit, undressing me in new ways. When I groaned, he smiled, fangs revealed.
“What is this?” I managed to ask around the massive lump in my throat. Alexi continued to move closer, and the icy pressure of unseen hands continued to caress me. My blood demon stirred, but didn’t wake. Thankfully. No way I wanted him to interrupt our encounter.
“Only my feeding aspect.” Gone was his fear for me, the pain of his torture, and even the suave charm he normally gave me. Alexi came within arm’s distance, expression nearly feral, voice dropping a full register as he practically growled at me. “I’ve never let it out near you, have always kept it carefully restrained. But now that we’re to be together…”
The force of his feeding aspect trebled, and I buckled beneath it. Alexi caught me before I could hit the ground, arms like iron as he cradled me. A swoon came over me as I bathed in his scent, my vision darkening and veins boiling. “I really wish you had.”
He ran lips along my jaw to my neck, fingers wrapping into my hair. “Forgive me, my beautiful Rook. This should have been more romantic.” I wasn’t given a chance to respond; Alexi drove sharp fangs deep into my neck.
I arched against him with the initial shock, crying out from the invasion. Alexi held me with a vise-like grip, mouth locked to my vein, teeth penetrating me with a force I’d never imagined.
Within a heartbeat, blissful rapture flooded me. I wrapped my hands in his hair, holding him closer, moaning helplessly. My life danced against his lips, burning through my veins to my very center, exposing me to new levels of ecstasy.
Alexi growled as he drew my blood, rocking me in time with my heartbeat. Somehow, it was like I’d always lived in his arms. Boneless, trembling, I sagged, voice rising higher and higher with each moan.
My throat clenched and heart stumbled as something in my very soul clicked. Alexi groaned deeply, the sound rattling though both of us. Time paused for the two of us, frozen in the flow of blood from me to him. We resonated, harmonized, and our souls grew lighter and blazed.
The vampire growled, breaking the spell, and renewed his drinking, but with more force. The blood demon shivered from the fierceness, sharing my rapture while still quiescent. I crested through an unexpected orgasm, and was suffused with a feeling of completeness.
Alexi and I were one.
He stopped after a time, though I didn’t know of what length. I moaned and shuddered, becoming aware of the surrounding world once more. Tears soaked my temples, and my thighs nearly dripped with my juices. A hammering heart and ragged breathing did nothing to mask the new bond to the vampire.
“Am I your thrall?” I managed to ask, lolling in his embrace.
“No,” was his husky reply. “You are my mate, my progeny.” Two years of waiting came to an end as he kissed me deeply. Would that I could live in that embrace.
