by Jade White
* * *
“Dammit,” Reign swore, “I lost him.”
She and Cara followed one to a secondary room; it was a smaller dance hall where the DJ for the second floor was. It fit about fifty people and it was also the only way down to the first floor. Two large men in black shirts labeled ‘security’ stood at the stairs, no one was getting up or down that way.
There were some bathrooms at the other end, and she motioned to Cara, who went to check them. Reign looked about with her enhanced vision, and while she could see everyone there, she realized the walls were stopping her.
“Damn, damn.” She snapped her normal eyes back and looked around. There was a bar, some booths, the bathrooms, and a small row of VIP rooms. She ran to the bar, she didn’t think she had much time, Cara was sure the vamp was hunting and she didn’t want someone else dying because she wasn’t fast enough. By the time Cara returned from checking the hall and bathrooms all that was left were the three VIP booths.
“Can you smell or hear anything?” Reign asked.
Cara gave her a sideways look. “In here? I may be a good tracker but there’s just no way,” she said with a frown.
“Okay, lets go over by the booths, maybe we can get lucky, but I don’t want to get thrown out before we find him.” The VIP rooms were really just very thick theatrical curtains hung from the ceiling and acted as the fourth wall to three rooms that had been constructed around the booths in the corner.
She motioned for Cara to listen to the first room. Cara held her head close to the curtain for a moment. Reign looked to security who was looking back and talking into his radio.
“We’re almost out of time, anything?” she asked. Cara shook her head, they moved to the next one. Cara’s eyebrows furrowed and she moved a little closer.
She looked to Reign and motioned. “I hear some slurping, could be the one, or it could be a guy getting a blow job,” Cara said. Reign nodded they would have to take the chance. She let her vision slip back into the Fade and she put her hand on Cara’s shoulder; it was dark in here and the walls were hard to see in the Fade. She squeezed and Cara went in.
At first Reign was puzzled, she could see the bright pink aura of a girl, she knelt before a man, obviously giving him head, but the man’s aura… it was black, like a giant hole in the Fade. She suddenly felt dizzy and she could feel Cara stiffen next to her.
“This must be my lucky night girls, there’s plenty of me to go around,” he said in a very smooth, soft voice. Cara took a step, but couldn’t stop herself from going and kneeling next to the man, suddenly Reign saw her friend share a kiss with the young girl who was there and then they were both sucking the man’s dick.
Anger burned the dizzy out of Reign. She could see tendrils of black wrapping around Cara and reaching out for her, pulling her aura to his. The poor girl who was already there was practically choking on the tendrils and didn’t even know it.
Suddenly Reign understood. They couldn’t be killed, not because they weren’t alive, but because they weren’t actually here. The black hole that was the vampire’s aura was just that, it was not in the shape of a man, but simply all there was.
It must project a physical form into her world, as if she projected hers into the Fade. She needed another moment to study his form, so she slowly walked forward, mimicking Cara’s stumbling. Cara was pushing the girl's head down on to the man’s dick and holding it there, a look of joy and glee on her face.
Reign had enough. She held out her hand and a blade of white light shot out, severing all the tentacles between the man and the girls. The girl sputtered and screamed as she pulled her head up. Cara looked confused, as did the vampire.
“What, what did you do?” he said, shock apparent on his face.
“Cara, help the girl, me and this fellow are going to have a little chat.”
“Reign, what’s going on, I…”
“It’s okay, I’ll explain later, but first, get her dressed and in a cab, she needs to go home.”
Cara obeyed; quickly she helped the now sobbing, near hysterical girl get dressed. It only took a minute and they were gone. Reign stayed in the Fade the entire time; in her hand, she grasped the sword of light she used to sever the vampire’s tendrils, and while she didn’t think he even knew what he was, she could see his reaction as she waved the blade near his aura.
“What’s your name, vampire?” she said. He looked up to her, his eyes narrowing.
“Who are you? What have you done, how do you know what I am?” he questioned, with an undercurrent of fear in his voice.
“Let’s not pretend you have any power here.” She waved the sword near his aura and it shrank away from the light. In the physical world, he cringed and grasped his side.
“How?” he said through clenched teeth.
“I’ll ask the questions, answer me or the next time you will feel my sting.” She tried to muster as much menace as she could in her voice. To her she sounded a little bit ridiculous. But then again, she was wielding a sword made of light, threatening a vampire.
You would think I would be afraid.
“Pearson,” he finally said.
“Good. How old are you?” she asked, more out of curiosity than need.
“Two hundred, not counting my time as a human.”
Not nearly as old as Richard, but then again she got the feeling few were.
Time to get down to business.
“Where’s Richard?”
“Who?”
She stabbed the blob of darkness with the sword. The man screamed a guttural howl that she was sure would bring security. Tears welled up in his eyes and sprung forth and he sobbed.
“I don’t know who that is, please believe me,” he sobbed, holding his leg as if she had stabbed him.
“The werewolf, the one your men took, with the bitch who looks like she belongs in a bondage video --- tell me where he is or I swear to god I will erase you from the universe.”
From the look Pearson gave her, she knew he believed her.
“I didn’t know his name, I’m sorry, I swear,” he whimpered. “We are holding him in the basement of the mansion. Please let me go, I promise I’ll leave.”
Somehow, Reign had expected it to be much harder than this. The curtain opened and Cara came in. Pearson jumped up and vanished in a puff of smoke.
But Reign saw what actually happened, he opened a door to the Fade and went through it. She grabbed Cara’s hand, opened the same door, and followed.
*
Cara gasped and shuddered as they moved through the Fade. The vampire shot through the Fade like an arrow, but he did not go far. Reign figured that he could go maybe a little more than a mile. They appeared in an alley just moments behind him. Cara dropped to her knees and vomited everything she ate that day.
Still holding her hand, Reign stayed focused, another door was there.
“Sorry, honey,” she said, opening the door and dragging Cara through it.
“Fuck no,” Cara screamed before her voice was lost in the rush of the Fade. Reign followed the vampire’s trail, a thick blackness left by his passing. The Fade rushed by as Reign moved them through.
She felt a disturbance this time, almost a turbulence, dragging at her. She looked to Cara. Cara was there with her, but so was her wolf, together mixed as one, both surprised by their presence in the same place at the same time.
The door opened and she and Cara were back in the real world. Cara jerked her hand from Reign’s fiercely before vomiting again.
Reign looked around, she saw no more doors. It took her a moment to recognize where they were. Lake Union. To the east was the lake and the Ship Canal Bridge, a giant span that stretched more than five hundred feet up and over the lake. They stood on the cliffs overlooking the lake. Reign turned around and she knew they found the right place. One of half a dozen mansions overlooked the Lake; the closest one had to be it.
“Reign,” Cara moaned, “no more, god, no more please,” she whimpered
.
Reign knelt by her friend, “Cara, what’s wrong?”
“For one,” she answered, wiping her mouth, “it’s incredibly painful, and it’s like the worst motion sickness ever,” Cara said as she carefully stood, not sure if she could trust her muscles.
“Reign, I think you could kill me there, in the Fade. I mean I was all there, with my wolf and everything. It’s like, if I die here I would go there, and live with them, but if you killed me there… I would be gone,” she said with a shudder. Without warning, she wrapped her arms around Reign. “Please don’t make me go back there, not ever. I would rather die.”
Reign didn’t know what to say, so she just returned the hug and reassured her friend that it would be okay. She was not sure why the vampires’ mode of travel was so different than her own, or maybe they didn’t even know. When she Fade Walked, it was instant; in one moment she was where she wanted to be, no travel involved. Perhaps the vampires weren’t as strong as they pretended to be, or perhaps she was something they hadn’t seen before.
“You okay?” she asked Cara.
“I will be, thanks, what’s next?”
“They know we know, but they probably think it will take some time to get here, so let’s look around. Can you shift? We could use your super sniffer?”
Cara looked uneasy. “I guess I have to at some point.” She took a step back and stripped off her dress and underthings.
Reign admired her friend once again. “I’m kind of sad I don’t get to be a wolf,” she said with a little regret.
“Why?” Cara asked.
Reign pointed to Cara’s near perfect body and smirked “You could make millions turning people into wolves just so they would look like you!”
“Oh, yeah, I guess that’s part of the advantage, but I think if I had it to do again, I’d rather be me.’ The profound sadness in Cara’s voice tugged at her soul.
“I’m sorry,” she offered.
“It’s okay, I guess, at least…at least I know where I’m going when I die.” She shifted before Reign could respond.
The wolf was before her, and suddenly Reign realized that Cara was two people, her human self, and the wolf spirit, and right now, it was the wolf who looked out to her.
She knelt down beside it, putting her hand to its head. “Listen, I’m the least of your problems, right now these bloodsuckers have Richard, and I want him back, if Cara’s in there then you know this, so help me, and I won’t make any trouble for you or your kind, I swear.”
If her oath was good enough Reign didn’t know, she couldn’t read the wolf’s expression. It simply padded off into the bushes. Reign followed her. If she could find a way in where they didn’t have to deal with people, all the better. The wolf followed a track only it could see, around the side of the mansion, and then it stopped, sniffed the air a few times, and then followed the smell away from the mansion.
Reign wanted to say they were going in the wrong way, but she held her tongue. She followed behind down the road to the main avenue. It was dark and Westlake Drive was a business street, nothing was open late. The wolf came to the first building and pawed at the door, and whined a few times.
“Is this it?” Reign asked, the wolf pawed at the door again. Reign tried it -- locked. She looked inside the window; the sign said it was some kind of tackle shop, and everything inside seemed to match.
“Wait, let me try something, don’t eat anyone,” she said with a laugh.
She opened her eyes to the Fade. There was no door to follow, she figured as much, she got the feeling they vanished quickly. Raising her arms up, she focused on the Fade and she drew a circle in front of her. Then, she stepped through.
She was in the Fade, her actual physical body was there. She could still see the real world though, but it was hazy and indistinct. She walked a few feet forward, drew another circle then stepped through.
She was back in the real world, standing in the shop now. She let her Fade sense slip and looked around. It was dusty, no one used this shop, or took care of it. She opened the door from the inside, letting Cara in.
Something about the wolf was different now; she licked Reign’s hand and nuzzled it. Reign smiled and scratched her behind her ears. “Good girl, now, find us a way in.”
Cara prowled the shop, sniffing the air here and there. She sneezed once before finding what she was looking for. She scratched at a bit of the floor with a rug on it. Reign lifted the rug up and sure enough, there was a trap door. The door wasn’t locked and opened with a tug. Cara lunged in first and was down the stairs and out of sight in an instant.
Reign leaped in after her, taking the steps two at a time trying to catch up. She was afraid to shout out after her, not wanting to give away the element of surprise. It took her a minute; the tunnel wasn’t flat, it went up slightly as she walked and the light in it was sparse. She heard scratching up ahead. She slowed down, wishing she had thought to bring a flashlight.
She found Cara scratching at a thick wooden door. A harsh red light shown above it, barely bright enough to illuminate Cara’s furry features. Reign tried the knob. It was unlocked.
“I don’t know what we’re going to find in here, but the only way for me to fight them is in the Fade, so let me hold on to you, and you guide me to him, and I’ll keep watch in the only place I can be of help, okay?”
Cara responded by licking Reign’s face with her leathery tongue.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” she deadpanned.
***
Everything was hazy now, even the haze was dim and distorted. Pain and pleasure were two old friends of his, and they seemed to have taken up residence. Time meant nothing to him now, he’d lost track of how many times Dulci had fed on him, how often she’d cut into him, burned him. He looked down at his body, it was a shell of what it once was, his regenerative powers were working hard to keep him alive, but they wouldn’t last much longer.
He would not, he could not, give in to her. What she failed to realize was that he knew the price, and he was willing to pay it, and no amount of pain or forced pleasure would pull him away from it.
The chain trapped him, if it weren’t for its slithering band he would have escaped long ago, but its magical properties bound him too tightly. The door opened again and he felt the rush of cold air on his skin. Dulci was back, her long black hair in a bun this time, her face smeared with makeup in a gaudy fashion that Richard knew Reign would never wear.
.
“I see your almost ready, my dear, there isn’t much left of you to feed on, your time is short. Join me and together we can bring each other such joy and beauty,” Dulci said with a feverish conviction.
During the great war, Richard decided to take up arms in defense of his country. He enlisted as a spy, essentially, and he was trained to resist interrogation, truth serums, and all kinds of torture.
No human could resist forever, but they never imagined a werewolf using those same techniques.
“The monkey climbed up the coconut tree and picked a coconut,” he said aloud and in his mind. Dulci screamed with frustration, she pulled the knife down from the wall and stabbed him in his stomach. The pain was sharp, but the constant torture had made him familiar with the pain.
“The monkey climbed up the coconut tree and picked a coconut,” he grunted.
“Say something else, say you’ll worship at my feet and this will all end!”
She bit down onto his neck, the intense pleasure of her bite sharpening his senses and making the pain from the dagger wound even more real. She forced his head aside as she fed, drinking his blood in huge gulps.
“The monkey climbed up the coconut tree and picked a coconut,” he said weakly.
She growled as she fed. Richard realized that this time she would not stop, and this was it. He closed his eyes and imagined Reign, her dark hair and features, her smile, her laugh, the way she snuggled with him when she was cold, or how she always used three towels when taking a shower. He even imagined he
could hear her voice.
“Get away from him, you bitch,” Reign shouted in the room. Dulci pulled her head up, Richard’s blood spattering against her face.
Richard opened his eyes and lifted his head as far as the chain would let him. Reign was there, with a wolf that looked like Cara’s. Richard thought he must be hallucinating, he was dead and this was the end. Cara was dead, could she be there with Reign?
Dulci wiped her mouth with a long sleeve. “So you’re the little tramp he can’t get over?”
