Vampire Master: Vampire Queen Series: Club Atlantis

by Joey W. Hill

  “Don’t worry, Ella.” Bill spoke. “He knows where you are. Just rest. He’s coming. Hey, you know, I came to that club of yours a couple times as a guest of a buddy of mine. Well, he used to be a buddy. We don’t get along much anymore. He thought I had the wrong ‘mindset’ for it.” Bill shrugged. “But it was a nice place. I applied for membership on my own, but was turned down, probably because of him. Whatever. Though it definitely had a better layout than the place I used to go in Florida—”

  No… Ella was only halfway listening. Even though she knew she needed to pay closer attention, the fear that had seized her mind took priority. This wasn’t about her. It was about Wolf. He wanted Wolf to come. Don’t come here… Stay away.

  Even through that haze, she tried to give him a picture of what was happening, so he’d know. But she was under again, time passing. Yet now she knew Wolf was in danger. In her consciousness, she thrashed, she screamed at herself, she visualized catapulting herself out of the muck of her concussion into full awareness.

  In the end, she succeeded, but rather than bouncing out of that torpor, she surfaced like a drowning swimmer, floundering, except one who could barely move. Oh, Goddess.

  In a very different situation, it would have amused her, how quickly she realized why she couldn’t move. She’d been restrained in so many creative ways, by so many Doms.

  But always in session, where there was a safe word, rules to protect her. Where the Dom put her wellbeing first. That thought brought a fear she fought not to let take her over.

  Her arms were folded in front of her, forearms taped to one another all the way past the wrists. Ankles and legs taped to the knees. She was in an incredibly uncomfortable chair. Her mouth was stuffed with something, a thick piece of tape over it. Bill stood in front of her. The affable expression had been replaced by a far different, far less friendly attentiveness.

  A thundering crash. In her disoriented state, it was so much like the sound of the alley explosion she flinched.

  But the noise was not a bomb. The loud noise had reverberated through the walls, making it seem louder than it was. She was in a small space, like a storeroom. Her third mark let her see Bill, but there was no light except what was coming from a dim source somewhere.

  Her head was aching, her neck. Her entire spine felt like it was vibrating. Someone was beating on something. Ripping something free. Advancing toward their location like a stampede of rabid bears.

  Bill picked up a hood and dropped it over her head. She tried to shake it free, no matter the illogic of resisting with her arms bound. He pulled it down to her shoulders, ran a strap around it that tightened on her throat, closed her in. She instantly felt like she couldn’t breathe, and had to tell herself that she could, that the fabric was porous, but it was dense, enough to make her feel like her air had been reduced significantly, especially with her mouth already gagged.

  Bill swiveled her office chair prison slowly around toward the wall. He put his knee between her spread ones, his fisted knuckles against her chest. He had bones that dug in, sharp and hard.

  She’d done deprivation play before, but that was different. Not being able to see what was going on, in a situation like this, wasn’t something she liked at all.

  “I know you’re listening in, vampire,” Bill said. “You don’t have to break through this door when you get to it. It’s unlocked. But here’s the sitrep. I’m wearing a gauntlet loaded with three steel spikes, six inches in length and a half inch in diameter. They will shred her heart when they pierce it. The back of this chair is a two-inch thick board. The barbed head of the spikes will lodge into the wood, keeping the shaft firmly penetrating her heart. If you come through that door intending to use your speed and strength to snatch her away from me, she’ll be dead. So I suggest you come in at a far more courteous pace.”

  She heard the squeak, a doorknob turning, and the waft of air as a door was opened, slow, cautious.

  She inhaled his heat, his scent, and was thankful for the third mark sense enhancement that allowed her to detect that, even through the hood.

  I’m here, Ella. Wolf’s voice, in her mind. It’s okay.

  She wanted to agree, but the relief that flooded her was matched by fear, a remembrance of her dream state, or whatever it was. Wolf was being drawn here on purpose. Ella was the bait.

  “Wolf,” Bill said, by way of greeting.

  “Do I know you?” Wolf’s voice was cold as death. She could almost see the lethal steadiness of his eyes. If Bill made one false move, Wolf would take him apart.

  Bill cleared his throat. The slight quaver said he was all too aware of it. “Flip the switch in that light box hanging in front of you, Wolf. It will drop a net over you. Do it now, or I kill her in front of you.”

  Please, Wolf. Don’t. I have a really bad feeling about this. Go get help, backup, something.

  “You have five seconds. Five, four, three, two…” The pressure of Bill’s knuckles increased, sending shards of pain through her chest.

  Air rushed against her face as the net was released, as it fell from above. No…

  It’s all right. We’ll figure this out, Ella. Just—

  A crackle of heat and electricity, a sharp hum. The impression of white-hot pain shot through her head, not hurting her directly, yet letting her know just what he was experiencing. She heard his grunts, felt the vibration of the floor as he went down, his body rolling or jerking.

  “Wolf.” She cried out against the gag.

  Bill yanked away her hood. She saw Wolf on the ground, under the net. The covering was a mesh of twisted metal. Once it had fallen upon him, Bill had activated an electrical current. It sparked along the lines of the mesh, burning into Wolf’s flesh, making him jerk. His lips were stretched back in an agonized grimace, his eyes wild. What tore her heart from her chest was how hard she could tell he was fighting to regain control. To help her.

  No, no, no.

  “There’s no point fighting,” Bill said. “When that level of voltage is running through you, even a vampire is incapable of directing his own movements. You’re helpless, and in a great deal of pain.”

  Several other people entered the storeroom. Serious looking people, in slacks and blouses, dress shirts with ties. Which made the gray rat eye masks they were wearing all the more surreal, complete with feral, pointed faces, whiskers, and rounded ears.

  They flipped on the lights in another part of the room and she saw a large metal cage there. As Ella screamed against the tape over her mouth, they used some kind of pincers with rubber handles to clamp onto Wolf’s limbs and drag him and the live charged net into the cage, dumping him there. His hand flailed, latched onto one of the bars, and electricity crackled there, pinning him between it and the net, his body arched up.

  Goddess, how much could he take? With sudden horror, she realized what it meant, that a vampire could only be killed by a couple things. It meant he could be tortured like this forever, without dying. But what could it do to his mind?

  Stop it, stop it, stop it.

  She wished she had the hood back on so she didn’t have to watch this, even as she needed to let her gaze cling to Wolf, to let him know she was there.

  The people, other than Bill, reminded her of scientists. One had even pulled out a tablet and it looked like he was inputting data.

  “It doesn’t yet prove it conclusively,” he said to Bill in an annoyed voice.

  “Not my department, bro. Take it up with your egghead boss. I’m in the homestretch here. Can’t wait to see this place and this shitass cover job in the rearview mirror.” Bill had straightened, removing the immediate threat from Ella, and he was keying something on his phone. A communication to someone?

  Or a program being deactivated.

  The electrical charge stopped. Wolf’s hand fell from the cage bars, leaving him in a crumpled heap on the floor. Two of the masked scientists pulled the net away, through the bars. Wolf was still conscious, rage-filled eyes on Bill, every muscle
bunched with the desire to do violence, no matter the agony those muscles must have been feeling only moments ago, that were likely still feeling.

  “Stand back,” Bill said. “I’m activating the cage.”

  She heard a hum, saw Wolf’s gaze course around him. The floor of the cage was covered with thick rubber, so it didn’t take her long to figure it out. The bars had been charged with the same debilitating voltage as the net. As long as he stayed seated in the cramped cage and kept his legs drawn up to stay away from any contact with the sides, he could be all right.

  Then Bill pointed a closed fist at her abdomen and pressed a trigger on the gauntlet.

  “No!”

  Wolf’s thunderous roar vibrated through her as the steel shafts went through her stomach. Adrenaline protected her for half a second, the shock of it, and then pain like she’d never felt before in her life took over. Nausea, pain, dizziness. She was suffocating from the pain.

  She vaguely heard the clang of the bars as Wolf threw himself against the cage, with enough force he ripped loose the bolts holding it to the floor. Unfortunately, that turned the cage onto its side, which put him on the fully charged bars, not the rubber flooring.

  She smelled that horrible chemical smell again as electricity met flesh. Wolf was knocked back, into the opposing side of bars, so the cage continued to electrocute him as his limbs flailed.

  She was screaming against the gag, telling them to stop, even as the pain made her feel like she was being sawed in half.

  He couldn’t speak in her mind while that was going on, but neither could he block his mind, so it was like tumbling in a jar of nails, stabbing her with words and cries and nothing but chaotic feeling.

  The scientists used those pincer things to right the cage, with effort. They pushed him back into a position away from the bars, holding him there while Wolf regained his senses. Somewhere amid a thicket of agony, she felt a horrifying gratitude to them for that.

  Bill looked merely satisfied that the cage was holding. It had been a test, she realized.

  Now he rose and came back to her. He gripped Ella’s hair and tipped her head back, looking into her tear-stained face thoughtfully. His thumb passed over a tiny track of saliva that had escaped around the tape, caused by her screams and sobs, her pain-wracked gasps. He leaned in, spoke against her ear. As he did, he tilted his head to meet her gaze. With his next whispered words, she knew why his eyes seemed so familiar.

  “Run, little pussy. Try to run.”

  Her blood went cold and he straightened, giving her a satisfied look. “Perry didn’t die for nothing,” he said. “But you likely will.”

  He jerked his head at the others. “Get them into the truck. He may have called someone as backup when she regained consciousness and he knew she was in trouble. We need to get where we’re going. Far beyond where anyone can help them.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Pain. So much pain. She figured she’d eventually die, because her mind still didn’t really believe what she’d been told, about a steel shaft through the heart being the only thing that could kill a full servant. But that was what Bill had threatened, before he shot three bolts into her abdomen instead.

  They’d been removed by a woman wearing purple latex gloves. She’d wrapped Ella’s stomach up tight in bandages to staunch the blood. She was given a handful of pain pills. They were neither cruel nor compassionate about the bandaging or drug administration. Just executing brisk, functional steps to ensure she didn’t slow them down.

  She’d been loaded into a truck container, dumped on a cot and strapped down on it, even with the taped bindings still in place on her arms and legs. Wolf’s cage was put in the roomy space. Even as they did that, he kept throwing himself against the electrified bars, trying to get to her.

  It was tearing her apart, watching it. She understood something animalistic had taken him over, his eyes red, fangs lengthening. She wanted to do something to help, to calm him, but she could barely think through the pain. Her blood was all over her purple glittery shirt. The throbbing was relentless. Having her body laid out flat and bound made it worse.

  Three of the male scientists in the rat masks approached the cage. Wolf moved back to the center, staring at them with those feral eyes. They reached through the bars with the clamps, seized Wolf around a wrist, forearm and biceps. It allowed them to pull his arm between one set of bars, hold it immobile so it wasn’t touching the electrified part. Though he could have struggled, now he’d gone deadly still, watching while another man wearing latex gloves approached, supplies to draw blood in hand.

  “You reach in there with that needle, he will remove your arm,” a familiar voice said. Bill, sitting on a stack of boxes, turned his head toward the recesses of the truck.

  “Hey, boss,” he said. “Everything you told us worked, like clockwork. Though this monster gave me some worries for a minute.”

  “I have employed you, Bill. It does not make me your boss. I expect you to do the job exactly as I laid it out, so you can earn payment. Go up front with the driver and keep a lookout.”

  It had taken her a mind a moment to wrap around it. She could see it hitting Wolf as well, the incredulity.

  Hollow stopped near Ella’s chair and frowned. “Now, as to the blood draw…”

  The three scientists looked at him blankly and he shook his head.

  “Waste of effort,” Hollow muttered, the first show of emotion she’d seen from him—irritation. “Just think.”

  “Wolf,” he said. “Ella needs your blood to heal and to ease her pain. Let Paul set up the line. No one in this room has any intrinsic value. Everyone is replaceable, so if you tear off his head, it won’t mean anything to us but a delay. She’s hurting badly, your servant. Help her.”

  Wolf fixed that glare on him, but some of the wildness died back as the words penetrated. His expression remained like fury-carved-in-granite, but he nodded, a short movement. “Reach in and get it,” Hollow said to the one he was calling Paul, a tall, thin rat-masked man. “Keep in mind, Wolf, Ella’s wound isn’t fatal. Misbehave, and I have no problem letting her suffer until we get where we’re going. We’re going to hit a lot of potholes along the way.”

  Wolf… She wanted to tell him not to do it, not to cooperate in any way, because they had no idea what the endgame was here, but Wolf sent her a look.

  Better chance of escape if we keep strong.

  Logical, though she still didn’t like it. Yet she was filled with relief to hear the coherent thought, clipped and rough though it was. Are you okay?

  Not even close. When you are safe and I tear everyone in this room into raw, bleeding meat, I will be okay.

  Fair enough. She had no argument with that plan.

  Paul cleared his throat. He looked a little pale and a lot diminutive next to Wolf, like a white mouse next to a crouching panther. “Make a fist,” he ventured.

  “Gladly,” Wolf said, showing his fangs.

  Would they offer juice and cookies afterward, like the Red Cross? Ella knew she was a little punchy, but anything to distract her from the pain would help. Had Wolf been able to alert anyone, or had he merely come to the loading dock when he couldn’t get a response from her, and followed her trail? She’d been pretty instantly unconscious, so he might not have seen she was in distress. Just suddenly radio silent and full dark.

  She bet the storeroom had been inside the loading dock warehouse, which meant he’d been far more likely to come in to find her, rather than going back to give anyone a heads up. But Disco Night. She’d be missed. They’d know something was up.

  A sudden ice-cold fear grabbed her gut. Saturnia. Oh Goddess. Was she part of this? She must be, because Hollow was third-marked. How could she not know he was doing this? What did they want?

  “No,” Hollow said to the woman who took the blood bag from Paul. She was picking up a needle, intending to set up a transfusion with Ella. “She can drink it. Film it, and keep your camera on the progression of her stom
ach wound. Document how drinking the blood heals her.”

  One of the masked men came and stood next to Hollow. From the color of his hands and his accent, he appeared to be Asian Indian. He had a good physique and thoughtful, intelligent eyes behind the mask. “She seems like a normal young woman. Disturbingly so.”

  “Yes. She’s new to the servant thing,” Hollow explained. “A sweet girl, not a fighter. Not that kind of fighter. If we condition her properly, she can become an ally. If we torture him enough, she may be able to read things out of his head, because he won’t be able to maintain his mind shields.”

  Like fucking hell.

  Hollow read it from her expression, and shook his head. “I’m not insulting you, Ella. Everyone breaks. I spent a lifetime learning how, from my own experiments and the techniques of others in my profession. You will give us everything we are seeking, and there will be no blame to it. It’s simply a matter of understanding human nature, how it responds under duress.”

  The tape was taken away, the gag removed from her mouth. She could see Wolf crouched on his heels in the electrified cage, his eyes on her. She wanted the Asian guy to move, because he was partly blocking her view of Wolf.

  Drink, Ella. He’s right about needing to keep up our strength. It’s okay.

  They are filming it. If I don’t drink, I won’t heal as fast and it won’t prove anything. At least not as effectively.

  They will not live to do whatever it is they intend to do. I need you to drink. I can bear my pain. Yours I can’t tolerate.

  Wolf. Master. Oh, Goddess.

  It’s okay, baby girl. Hang onto me. It’s okay.

  He was trying to orient his mind after the trauma of the electrocution, she could tell. He didn’t have the energy to block her out of it like he normally did, and she could see him rolling around contingencies, ideas, knowing they would have to wait this out and see when an opportunity presented itself. They’d have to stay alert for it. And he was worried as hell about her.

  I’m all right, Master. I’m here. I’ll keep alert, too.