by SJ Himes
He walked down the steps, pulling the thick collar of his warded sweater higher around his neck. It kept the rain from his skin, and blocked most of the wind. He felt the outer wards around Vamp HQ cling to him as he passed through them, and heard an almost audible pop as he left them behind. The wards hummed behind him while he walked down the street, and he marveled at the complexity and strength in the old magical constructs. Several sorcerers of adept ranking must have spent years crafting the wards in concert for them to be so vibrant decades later.
He looked back once at HQ, the Tower glowing above it, and saw a figure in the foyer where no one had been before. It moved with a lithe grace no human could come close to obtaining, but the vampire was too slim, and hair a dark brown instead of auburn, so it wasn’t Simeon, and Angel turned away, walking down the sidewalk.
Isaac’s apartment wasn’t too far away, and he could walk it in about thirty minutes. He was reluctant to be exposed for so long though—whoever sent the demon after him could easily do so again, and he didn’t want to be out in public if that happened. Too easy for innocent people to get killed in the fallout.
Angel frowned, something bothering him, but there was nothing he could sense, even with his second sight, that gave him that odd feeling. He pulled in the ambient magic around him, and used it as a spider would a web, and charged the gathered magic, sending it back out, tendrils out at his sides, front and back, even above. He would know for at least a block out in all directions if anything was coming his way, be it undead, demon, or human.
The street was empty. Not even a random pedestrian, foolhardy enough to brave the weather. Angel grumbled to himself but kept walking, keeping his eyes open and senses alert. He didn’t want to be caught unawares again, whether it was a mugger or a demon.
Isaac, at the incredibly wise age of twenty-three, decided he wanted to get his own place. That was a problem for Angel and for Isaac, not that his little brother would ever admit he wasn’t suited to live alone. Money wasn’t a problem, considering they were the sole two remaining heirs for the Salvatore fortune, but the problem lay in Isaac himself and his remarkable lack of maturity. And for Angel, it was an issue because keeping Isaac out of trouble was far easier when they shared a roof.
Angel skirted the dirty laundry on the floor next to the door, and he pocketed his keys. The wards he put in place to protect his brother were quiescent and thin, as if they hadn’t been used or charged since Angel laid them in place months earlier.
Which appeared to be the case.
He peered into the shadows of the unlit rooms, and tried to see if anyone was present. The smell of bong water, weed, and stale beer was heavy, and he curled his lip at the half-eaten pizza left to go bad on the coffee table. He should be more upset than he was already, but Isaac was never one for cleaning, and at twenty-three, didn’t care all that much about doing the dishes or laundry. It was over ten years since either of them had the benefit of servants, and Isaac was still acting like someone would come along and clean up after him. This bad habit of his carried over into the rest of his life, too. Angel lost track of how many times he’d rescued Isaac over the years, and Greg Doyle by extension, since that man was never far from Isaac’s side.
Except when he was cruising through gay bars and getting compelled by lowlife wizards.
Just thinking about last night’s excursion and Greg Doyle’s idiocy made Angel simmer. He walked down the hall, flipping switches as he went, but the lights stayed off. Isaac probably forgot to pay the utilities again. Isaac received a hefty quarterly stipend from his trust fund, so Isaac didn’t need to work to support himself. He needed to be reminded that he had to pay bills and actually eat something other than beer and pizza on a regular basis, and Angel was afraid to look in the refrigerator after the last time.
“Isaac! Are you home? Don’t tell me you forgot to pay the light bill again, you know they charge a bigger deposit each time to get the power back on…” Angel called out as he headed through the dark for Isaac’s room. He heard moaning, and what sounded like whispering, and braced himself for what he might see when he opened the door. Knocking and waiting would just mean he would spend the rest of his life in this hallway waiting on Isaac to open the door.
“You better be getting attacked by vampires, I don’t need to see…” Angel pushed open the door to his brother’s room, and blinked as his eyes adjusted to the shadows and the light streaming in from the windows that faced the street. “For fuck’s sake, didn’t you hear me knocking and yelling your name?”
Greg Doyle pulled his mouth off Isaac’s cock, lips wet and red. Isaac grabbed at his head and tried to pull him back down, but Angel’s glare made Greg squirm free of Isaac’s grip and get to his feet from where he was kneeling beside the bed. Angel looked away from his naked brother and his excited state, glaring at the ceiling.
“Dammit, Angie, what the hell? Don’t you know how to fucking knock?” Isaac swore as he grabbed a pillow and covered his lap with it, and Angel looked down to see Greg hurriedly pulling on a pair of jeans. Isaac’s long dark hair was highlighted in deep red and long enough to brush his shoulders, and messy from what Angel’s nose was telling him was a marathon day of bedroom antics. Nose itching, Angel tried the light switch but the lights stayed dark.
“I did knock, and I yelled, and I waited, but I guess you were occupied. Why are the lights out?” Angel said, leaning in the doorway and crossing his arms. “And why the hell haven’t you been answering your cell?”
“You haven’t called! And why should I answer you anyway?” Isaac was a champion pouter, a hold-over from his teenage years, and Angel again wondered for the millionth time where he went wrong raising Isaac after their parents died. Though it was problematic for a twenty-year-old man to suddenly be responsible for the well-being of a thirteen-year-old boy, even if they were brothers. Angel had spent his own teenage years studying sorcery and the higher level magics, leaving little time for quality time with Isaac. He never regretted that more than he did now as an adult, looking at Isaac’s angry and unrepentant face.
“You should answer me because I was worried, you little shit. I had to go clean out your fuck buddy’s brains last night after he got compelled to break into Vamp HQ, and this morning I got attacked by a demon and had to blow up the street to banish it. And you fucking wouldn’t answer your phone!”
“Demons don’t attack in daylight,” Isaac said, routing about the bed, and pulling out a pair of boxer-briefs. Angel was thankful his brother decided to put on some clothing, and he noted the addition of another set of tattoos on his arms and torso. Isaac pulled a wrinkled tee over his chest before Angel could get a better look in the shadows.
“How would you know? You don’t practice,” Angel snarked back, “and I banished it with dawn’s light and destruction of the circle. Don’t distract me. Why the hell are the lights out? Is your cell down too?” Angel kept his eyes on Isaac, and saw the minuscule flinch as Angel’s words hit home. “Great. You get paid a ridiculous amount of money to live like a prince and you can’t even bother to pay your bills? You’re twenty-three, Isaac, not a damn kid.”
“You’re right! I’m not a kid! So why don’t you leave me alone?” Isaac snarled, and Angel tensed. That was a common refrain from Isaac, that Angel leave him be, but the second Isaac got drunk and ended up lost in the city without his wallet or cash, or thrown in jail and needed bail, it was Angel he called to come save his ass. Every time.
“I would leave you alone,” Angel gritted out, barely restraining himself. Greg was watching them both, shirt forgotten in his hands, eyes darting back and forth between them. “I would leave you be if I wasn’t so damn sure you’d end up either dead or in jail if I didn’t keep an eye on you. The wards aren’t even powered up! Have you done anything with them since I put them in place? And did you not hear me say that your cock-sucking buddy over there got compelled to invade Vamp HQ, or that a demon went after me this morning?”
“Dead or in jail
I wouldn’t have to listen to you bitch all the damn time,” Isaac snapped back, and Angel tamped down on his anger. This was how it always went between them now, ending in arguments and fights. Where the hell did the quiet, bookish boy go who used to follow him around all day asking questions?
“And yeah, Greg told me about the hex. Probably just a prank went wrong. And you’re such an ass, Angel, I’m not surprised someone sent a demon after you. You probably have a whole list of people wanting you dead.”
“No one pays five-thousand dollars and drops a hex on someone to break into the Master of Boston’s headquarters and not steal something all for a damn prank, Isaac. That shit just doesn’t happen. No wizard-ranked practitioner is going to risk himself like that for a joke. Someone is circling us, I know it, and if you aren’t careful they could come for you next. So that means you pay your electric bill, power your wards up, turn your cell back on, and make smarter choices about who you fuck.”
He knew, from the second the words left his mouth, that all he was doing was making it worse. Yet he couldn’t stop himself; there was no reason that he knew of for Isaac to live like a slob and be so irresponsible, and his choice of lover and friend in Greg Doyle would forever confound him. Isaac’s face twisted with fury, and he threw his pillow at Angel. He batted it away, and Isaac sprang to his feet, pointing at him, whole body shaking with anger.
“You’re a fucking stuck-up hypocrite, Angie. I’m not the one sleeping with vampires and teaching kids how to blow shit up and bend the veil. What you’re doing is an insult to our family’s memory,” Isaac was so mad his eyes were wild and his finger shook as he stabbed Angel in the chest with the tip. Isaac was taller than him now, over six feet, and was long, lanky muscles over slim bones. Isaac was a handsome man, when he wasn’t hungover and needing a shower.
Angel was so struck by the difference in Isaac from the boy he raised that it took Isaac poking him hard enough to make him stumble that he thought about what his brother said. “I’m not sleeping with any vampires, dammit. And our family has taught high sorcery for hundreds of years, so how is that a disgrace to their memory?”
“So you aren’t fucking the Celt? That’s not what I heard,” Isaac tossed his hair back out of his eyes, glaring, and Angel slapped Isaac’s finger away from his chest. Typically, Isaac ignored anything he didn’t want to acknowledge, and he disregarded the fact that the Salvatore family history was full of teachers. Greg Doyle seemed to find something interesting in the corner to stare at, and Angel scowled at him before glaring back at Isaac. “Detective Collins says the Celt spent the night in your bed.”
“How the fuck….” Angel started, but he bit it off. The cameras across the street would have shown Simeon carrying Angel up into his apartment after the vamp took him home. “The statehouse cameras. Goddammit. Did Collins give you trouble? That rude ass tried to curse me this morning after I banished the demon.”
“I told that ass I had no idea what was going on and to shove his questions, right before I slammed the door in his face,” Isaac snapped back, which Angel could easily see since that’s what Isaac did to him every time they spoke. “So you are sleeping with him? And you dare complain about Greg?”
“I am not sleeping with Elder Simeon. And if I was,” Angel stressed his next words, “It would be none of your business. The Master and his Elders are not part of the clan who killed our family, your animosity does nothing but piss off the wrong people.”
“A fanghead is a fanghead,” Isaac said, brushing past Angel into the hall. Angel followed him down the hallway to the kitchen, where Isaac opened the fridge and then slammed it shut again, the light inside staying dark. “Fuck! I guess the power is out.”
“That is what happens when you don’t pay the bills,” Angel muttered, kicking aside a few pairs of dirty socks. Who took off their socks in the kitchen? “And why go to vamp bars all the time if you bear them such a grudge?”
“They have the best booze.”
Personally, Angel thought it was because of all the places Isaac could go to party, he always went to a vampire bar, both courting danger and being protected by it—he was a sorcerer, so he wasn’t food; he was a Salvatore, so he was hated and reviled; he was safe in the clan bars as he would not be in human establishments—Angel’s vow from Simeon meant Isaac was untouchable in all the places run by the vampire clan in Boston and surrounding areas.
Angel could see the destructive behavior, but had no answer for it. He didn’t know what drove Isaac to ignore him and yet when he was in trouble, Angel was always the person Isaac called first—in fact, he was the only person Isaac called. It both broke his heart and left him frustrated.
Angel rolled his eyes and sat in the lone chair at the tiny, cluttered table in the kitchen. He refused to guess what any of the items were that littered the table top. “Why haven’t you activated the wards I put in place? You know how to power them, I taught you myself.”
Isaac was facing the sink, probably trying to find a clean glass amongst the dirty dishes covering the counter top and filling the basin. Angel looked around, and it seemed like every piece of cutlery was dirty, and there was a fine layer of dust on the appliances. Isaac was never this bad when he lived with Angel. Isaac didn’t answer him, and Angel took in his stiff shoulders and his lowered head. Isaac was stubborn and reckless with his safety, and Angel had no idea why. Ever since Isaac turned eighteen, his attitude and behavior grew steadily worse. They may never have been close as children, with Angel being seven years the elder, but Isaac had been somewhat responsible as a teenager after Angel took custody. This belligerence and casual disregard for his own safety, and lack of concern for his own brother, was troubling.
“Isaac? The wards?” Angel reiterated, trying to get a response.
“I forgot about them! Fuck! Why is it so damn important to you that I activate the fucking wards?” Isaac snapped, and a glass broke in the sink with a racket, shards bouncing off the steel. Energy pooled in a scarlet glow around Isaac’s tense frame, and Angel waited, hoping Isaac found his control.
“Because, as I was just reminded by you a few moments ago, vampires killed our whole family, and not many people like me, so that means they can get to me through you. Because someone tried to get your lover killed by sending him into Vamp HQ under compulsion. Because, Isaac, a demon destroyed my apartment and tried to kill me.” Angel stressed, one hand gripping the table as Isaac’s power tumbled through the room. “History has proven that when one Salvatore is in danger, so are we all. There is no coincidence in the very small world of those who practice. You know this. Please use the damn wards.”
“I don’t practice. I don’t use magic,” Isaac all but growled at him, and Angel sighed, fed up. That glass broke because Isaac wasn’t exerting enough control over his abilities.
“Your aura is out of control, Isaac, and you’re spilling energy into the kitchen. Use your magic and what I’ve taught you, or your magic will use you.”
Silence greeted his last statement, and Angel waited. The scent of heating metal rose from the sink, and the edge of the steel basin glowed beneath his brother’s hands. Angel stilled, ready to intercede if Isaac lost control and set fire to his kitchen. He waited, but Isaac pulled most of it back, and Angel relaxed. Isaac pushed away from the sink and walked past Angel without looking at him. “Get out, Angie. Leave me alone.”
Isaac left the kitchen, red aura spilling and twisting in flashy trails of light behind him. He slammed the door to his room, leaving Angel at the table. Angel slouched in the chair, alone in the smelly, dusty, disgusting excuse for a kitchen, and broke a long-standing promise to himself to never hire someone to do something for Isaac or himself that they could do on their own.
He pulled out his cell, and started searching for cleaning services. His brother was not going to live in squalor in an apartment that cost in a year as much as the average household’s car.
Angel got up from the table, and walked out to the living room, taking i
n the sad state of the expensive apartment his brother treated like a crash pad. Less than a year on his own and Isaac was living like a squatter in his own home.
Angel sent one last look down the hall to where he could hear Isaac and Greg talking, their words indistinct. Leaving Isaac unprotected was not an option. He saved a link to a high-rated cleaning service, and tucked his cell away.
Closing his eyes, Angel sent his awareness out, and activated the wards. They were barely awake, lacking in power, and it was more than obvious that Isaac hadn’t even spared them a single line of energy since Angel put them in place the day Isaac moved in. Angel opened up his connection to the veil, a thin line that was more than enough to charge the wards to full power. He let the power build, activating all of them, and then laid down a new layer, one that would prevent Isaac from turning them off. His brother was powerful enough to do it, but Angel was certain Isaac was too lazy to bother spending the effort required to bring them down. Better safe than sorry, though, so he locked Isaac out of the wards.
Angel withdrew from his connection to the veil and pulled his mind away from the wards. They glowed to his inner eye, vibrant and active. Angel left Isaac’s apartment, making sure the door was locked behind him. He dialed the cleaners’ number as he walked back out to the street.
The snow was melting as soon as it touched the ground. The faintest of hissing sounds made by the tiny flakes falling and his breathing were the only sounds in the quiet cemetery, Angel the only living soul present. Angel gripped the iron spikes of the fence that surrounded King’s Chapel Burying Grounds, the shadows deep, seamless. The closest rows of headstones were visible, the dates and names wore down by time and weather. Coastal winds were unkind to the markings of man, scouring them to nothing and toppling even the strongest of stones.
