That spins me; they have their own version of a Department of Resources? Can't have too many wolves for this many deer? In this case too many vampires for this many humans. It has never occurred to me. That means . . .
"They want you to turn me into one of you!"
The floor drops out from under me and I'm standing on the edge of a gaping maw that I can't possibly know the depth of. How could I be a monster like them? Then I feel something deep inside me purr, a cat rumbles softly at the warming thoughts and Wolf nods, still not looking at me.
"You don't want to." It's obvious in his stance and his refusal to look at me directly.
He shakes his head.
"Why not? Am I not good enough for you?"
Anger rises in me to mask the hurt. I feel thrown away, refused by this man I think I might love but when he has the opportunity to really be with me he doesn't want to? This part of me wars with the other side that doesn't want to die, that is afraid of change. That part I suppress, that part is the victim, the prey, and I am not that person anymore. I will embrace this fate; I will become the predator in truth, make the decisions and control my life. I feel a manic glee building inside me.
Wolf turns and looks at me, his jaw tense and his lips start to move but then he stops. Something is behind those eyes of his, old darkness and old pains. Even his beast seems cowed by what is in his mind, pulling back from the wooden door that keeps it caged. He looks to the ground, hands clenching into fists and unclenching. His jaw muscles work to form the words but something keeps stopping him. Finally he looks at me directly.
"It is not easy. No one else can walk this path with me," he says at last.
"So you would kill me instead?" I demand.
I feel myself on that edge into oblivion before me, I have to do something. I reach out to his beast, stroking it with my desire for this man, appealing to the base desire to mate, offering that monster my body in return for its help. As I do so, I step closer to Wolf, looking up at him. I press myself against him; I trace the line of his jaw with my hand and reach around to entangle my fingers in his hair, pulling him down towards me. He doesn't resist, he can't resist this. Our lips meet, warmth to cold, and I feel his desire raging and my own answering.
"I will choose my own fate Wolf."
His arms are enclosing my waist and tense with strained muscle at my words. There is barely an inch between us, I stare into his eyes while gently stroking his beast. I feel that animal inside him beating against its locked door, pulling at the chain he binds it in there with. I marvel at his exercise of will to restrain himself from it. How does he manage it? Part of me wants him to just take me, right here on this short elevator ride but he pushes me away, turning as he does so. I feel disappointed, saddened at unwillingness to let go for me.
"Fine," he says at last. "Your choice."
He takes a step away from me, facing the door, his jaw is clenched tight. I see his hands are balled into fists, I can feel the anger seething in him, the beast still challenging him for control. I hold my breath, I can't help it. The hairs on the back of my neck stand up, he is barely controlling it now and I feel guilty, my urging has made this much harder for him. I suddenly realize I am locked in a small box with a monster that is about to lose control.
CHAPTER EIGHT
T
he tension in the elevator going down is overwhelming. Wolf struggles to keep his beast caged and I can feel the colossal effort it takes him. It leaps and slams into Wolf's walls, straining at the chains that bind it down. I sense them weakening and I feel a moment of fear. That monster wants to kill and I don't think it's going to care who or what satisfies that desire. The elevator dings just as I feel it break free.
Wolf explodes into motion before the doors are completely open. I blink and he has Balthazar by the neck, lifting, but wings burst out of Balthazar's back flapping and pulling him from Wolf's grasp. I scream as Wolf drops to a crouch, claws extend from his fingers, and his face is starting to elongate. Balthazar flies back from Wolf putting distance between them. I crouch to the side of the elevator and peer around the corner. The two of them circle each other, no words being spoken. I reach out to Wolf's beast, I see it in my mind, the door is open but it is still chained, not completely free.
Wolf leaps at Balthazar, an impossible leap straight into the air, but Balthazar is able to dodge the attack. Wolf arcs through the air, rolls on the ground and lands in a crouch still facing his opponent. I order his beast to be calm but to no effect. I try stroking it but I can't seem to get a firm hold on it in my mind, the amorphous darkness that forms it pulls away from my touch without ever losing focus on its prey. I hear Wolf growl, Balthazar yells something, but it is all in the distance. I focus on this mental landscape.
Music. I start to sing to his beast, a wordless tune, something hummed to me when I was a baby. I mentally project the song into the beast and it starts to respond. I see the tension begin to flow out of Wolf, I feel the beast inside him settling, losing its control. He growls softer now and Balthazar lowers himself back to the floor, his wings fold in and disappear again. The two men walk toward each other while I put all my attention on the song, pouring it out and into the beast as it slinks back into its cage. The door swings shut and I feel it click, the lock turning itself.
Balthazar and Wolf stand two feet apart and Wolf reaches out a hand which Balthazar takes. Neither of them says a word, just grasp and nod. This must be nothing new for the two of them. I realize then that Balthazar knew what had taken place upstairs. He also must know why Wolf did not want to turn me. There is something there, a story behind the sadness in his eyes and his reluctance.
"Tonight we hunt," Wolf says.
"Yes. I know the area it has been stalking. I have yet to track it down though." Balthazar responds.
Wolf nods. "We'll need to lead it away from the population. We need bait." He looks at me as he says the last and Balthazar turns to look at me with him.
"Are you sure?" Balthazar asks.
"Up to her," Wolf answers.
"What is up to me?" I stand at last coming out from what protection and cover the elevator offers. I know what Wolf is thinking, or at least I think I do.
"Be the bait, draw it out," he says.
"What exactly is 'it'," I ask.
Wolf looks at Balthazar and shrugs.
"I don't know how much you know about vampires," Balthazar begins.
I arch an eyebrow but say nothing.
"They have to maintain a balance between what they are and what they have become, the monster they are has to be controlled or else they give way to the base instincts. Hunt, kill, mate, but amplified and much gorier."
I nod that I understand him.
"The thing we have to hunt down and Wolf has to kill is one who failed to maintain that balance."
"So we have to find and Wolf has to kill a vampire gone off its meds." I say sarcastically. "What is the big deal with that?"
Wolf and Balthazar look at each other again and something passes between the two of them.
"When they give over completely their powers increase as well. He will be more powerful than his age and potency would dictate. A Fallen one becomes very dangerous in the extreme, not only to the Silence, but to the ones who take them down. Normally, I would take at least a dozen strong men to face a Fallen and expect to lose half that number."
I feel my eyes bulge, Wolf has to do this alone? And they want me to be bait?
"Are you serious?" my voice falters and I feel myself cracking again with the urge to laugh at the insanity of this quest.
"That is the judgment," Balthazar says.
The judgment, the sentence passed on my life by the vampires that control this city. Hatred makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and every pore on my body goose bumps tight enough to be painful. I don't care how, but I will repay them.
"Then let's do this," I say firmly, standing up to my full five foot two and staring straight at the two men. I
feel better immediately, my anger settling into hard resolve.
"She'll need protection," Wolf says to Balthazar.
"Of course," he says and smiles at me. "I admire your spunk girl. No wonder they want you." He turns towards the doors leading the way.
We emerge into the night air outside the Museum and the smell of the city settles around us. The decay of the place is subtle, especially here on the 'nice' side of town where we are, but it's always there just behind the facade that the day dwellers keep in place. The street away from the museum is mostly empty. Street lights form lone islands separating the darkness where they cut through it.
Both men look at the eastern horizon almost in unison. "Not enough hours to hunt tonight," Balthazar says and Wolf nods. "I will scout it out, lock down the area. We can meet on top of that building by the radio station you like." Balthazar takes three steps away, turns towards us and his wings spread from his back. The wings flap and he rises into the air. He pauses a moment, hanging there effortlessly.
"For what it's worth, I'm sorry," he says to me or to Wolf I'm not sure.
I nod in response and he takes off into the night sky quickly becoming a blip at the edge of my vision. I turn to Wolf alone with him at last, but he is staring off into the distance. I don't know what to say or do so I stand there next to him in silence. Athene's words come back to me, 'Wolf has eyes only for the moon.' I wonder at it and the lonely emptiness I feel inside. I contemplate dying, becoming another monster, worse than I already am. I haven't had much of a life to speak of, nothing that will be remembered when I am gone. No one will miss me, a funeral held for me would have few to no attendees and no one that really knows or cares about me. What measure is a life if it has touched no others? I have no family, no friends, no one to share my pain or my joy. I have no boyfriends or serious lovers.
"Time to head home," Wolf says without looking at me starts to walk off.
I stand there without moving, feeling numb and alone with my depressing thoughts.
He goes a few more steps, then turns to look back at me.
"Wolf, I don't want to be alone tonight," my voice catches, admission plain in it for him to hear. I look at him pleading in my eyes, I need him, I want him, now. "I'm scared Wolf." A tear, unbidden wells up. The words seem to break the dam inside and the uncertainty is there as a gaping chasm that wants to swallow me. I feel myself starting to shake as emotions too strong to express fill me. Wolf stands in the street staring at me with his head cocked to one side. I want him to hold me but at same time I want to beat him. He got me into this in the first place, none of this would have happened without him. I inhale a shaky breath as I struggle to hold back a flood of tears. Then his arms are around me, enclosing me in an island of safety. He blocks out the world and lifts the weight of it off of my shoulders. I can breathe again, I am not alone.
I wrap my arms around him in return, looking up to his face desperately reaching for contact, needing more of him.
"I can't," he says, his voice husky. "It's not right."
He sounds breathless himself, I can feel his desire physically and with my new senses, I know he wants this as much as I do. Right now, I don't care what else happens. I want him. My own death looms before me and I don't want to go to it without having had this with him. I reach out and stroke his beast and that inner darkness responds to my caress. I'm not sure how I do this; it's a feeling, a sense. Explaining it is like trying to explain color to a blind person but I know what the beast wants and I offer it direct to the monster, bypassing the man part of Wolf, I go straight to the animal and the animal responds.
His arms clench tighter around me, lifting me off my feet. He growls low in his throat and his lips mash into mine roughly. His tongue is insistent, searching, subduing my own when I return the kiss. I feel his nails digging into my back as his lips break from mine. He kisses down the side of my face, his lips trail across my neck, my collarbone, then his hand is in my hair and he pulls my head roughly to the left. He buries his face where my neck and shoulder meet; I feel something cold against my skin that I suddenly realize is his fangs. I shudder uncontrollably, too far gone for caution.
"Yes," I moan, pushing my hips against him, I want to feel him inside me. The beast in him rises up as if howling, I see it in my mind's eye and I know this is the moment when it will happen, I brace myself for the pain of it, anticipating tightening my body.
The cage slams around the beast; a wooden door comes in as if it is on my very face. I feel a cold shock as all heat and desire are gone, doused in a bucket of ice. I open my eyes in time to stumble as Wolf pushes me roughly back from him.
"What the hell!" I'm confused and struggling to orient myself.
He stands there staring at me for a moment and I think he has figured out what I'm doing. I feel a cold sweat on my skin; I'm unsure how he is going to react to what I can do. "Wolf . . ." I begin.
"No, not here, not like this," he says shaking his head.
I wrap my arms around myself and look down at the ground. He doesn't realize.
"Where then? When? Tomorrow I'm probably dead, when Wolf if not now? You taught me not to be prey, to be a predator. A predator takes what she wants. I want you. Now." I only look up at him on the final word. My eyes lock with his. I don't reach out to it but I can feel his struggle to contain the beast, it leaps at its chains and bangs on the door Wolf locks it behind. Sensing it there, I can see the struggle on his face as well, the tightening of his jaw as the monster leaps, the slight clenching of his hands.
I don't want to wait; I need him to acknowledge life is in me now. I reach out gently this time, just a touch on the beast trying to learn to finesse it. The instant I touch it with my senses though, it leaps, flaring to life with an incredible strength. I stumble back physically from it as well as mentally.
I am in his arms again but I didn't see him move. Wolf sweeps me off my feet and we are in the alley beside the museum slamming up against a wall. It knocks the breath from me. I struggle to inhale as his body weight presses against me. I feel the pressure of his beast, barely contained, pushing out against me as well at the solid hardness of his need through his jeans. Lust floods me; sensations assault all my senses at once. I try to focus in on one at a time, his tongue across my skin, the way his fangs drag as he kisses, the rip of my shirt as his claws come out and press into my skin. I thrust against him feeling his desire and wanting him inside. He pins me against the wall with his weight which frees his hands to explore me and I feel the rough texture of the stone behind me scraping against my back.
Once more his hand is in my hair pulling me roughly to the side and he buries his face against my neck. I feel his fangs, and as I do, the desire is overwhelming. I strain up against the fangs and thrust forward with my hips at the same time. I need this, I want this.
As his fangs pierce my skin I see stars, the world spins around me until the only thing I am aware of is that pin point where his teeth pierce my flesh. My heart pounds as if trying to push my blood into him. A moan tears from my throat as the pleasure continues to build. The darkness of the night begins to deepen, closing in on the edges of my vision. I pull the darkness of his beast into me at the same time I feel my own darkness pushing into him, the two beasts inside us entwining even as I wrap my legs around his waist and thrust against him.
I feel his member pressing against me so I reach out to his beast pushing that idea into it. I hear myself moan with pleasure again, feel his return thrusting against me as he laps at my neck. I feel myself flowing with it, his beast meeting up against the monster in me that wants this, needs this. He lifts his head from my neck and I feel lightheaded for a moment but it passes, he leans his head back looking up into the sky, I see his fangs with blood on them, my blood. I scream with pleasure, thrusting against him, wanting him inside me fully frustrated by the cloth that bars my need.
I want to free his straining manhood, to free it from the cage of denim so I push him back from me as I drop my legs
to the ground.
He takes a step back allowing me to drop to my knees before him. I fumble with his jeans growling in frustration but am able to free him at last. I admire him for a moment before I take him, tasting him in my own way now. His beast rumbles with pleasure as he pants with satisfaction. I take him deep in my throat setting a rhythm in time with the beating of my heart, working him fast. His hands entwine into my hair pulling at it as he takes control, forcing me up and down. Each moan of his pleasure elicits a response of the same in me. I use my hand and mouth to work him to ecstasy, looking into his eyes as he releases salty pleasure and I take it down.
He pulls again at my hair, still not completely spent. I marvel at his stamina as he jerks me to my feet then completely off of them. He pins me against the wall with one hand effortlessly using his other hand to remove my pants in a single action. He thrusts into me and my world shatters. Effortlessly we fall together into the cadence of our desire, pushing and pulling in harmony. Each thrust is ecstasy, each retreat a loss beyond description leaving a void that he fills a beat later. I wrap my arms around him, burying my face against him as our hips work back and forth. I grunt with each thrust in time with his own guttural sounds. As my orgasm builds I bite down onto his skin and dig my nails into his back. I beg for release, ready to give him everything and to take all that he has to offer. Wolf growls, long and low; a building sound that seems to have no end. His head leans back to the sky and he pulls my head back by my hair, together we stare up at the partial moon both howling as the final stages of ecstasy rip through us leaving us spent and shuddering.
I collapse against him, clinging to him, gently kissing his neck. He holds me without words. His beast, sated, settles back into its cage and I feel the same in myself - a sense of satisfaction, a primal urge met and fed. I cling to him feeling the cool strength of his body counter-posing to the rough stone behind me. The primal urge I felt feels like a cat purring inside with its own satisfaction. Some logical part of me, the civilized part I think feels doubt and some shred of embarrassment. The uncertainty tries to get a foothold in me but I push it down and instead pull the warm purring of my animal side over myself as a shield. I live in a world of predators and prey so I embrace being the predator and push away all thoughts of right or wrong holding to the moment I am in. Right and wrong can be for another day if I live that long.
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