Eternal Bondage

by Vita Anne Hoffman

  I tried to smile. “Does she like her new dogs?” It was the best way I had to signify acceptance of the bad circumstances.

  "She adores them, Avna."

  We both laid the sad subject to rest. We went upstairs, drank some vanilla caramel tea, ate a tray of crème horns, and avoided any mention of the two most prominent vampires in our lives. So long as she did not question me on Constantine, I returned the favor and did not bring up Gerard. Or their marriage license.

  And, of course, neither of us dared utter the name of Rasputin. For one evening, we were just giddy girlfriends. But outside, dark night, and every thing it brought with it, was quickly descending.

  * * * *

  The next day, a Thursday, was average. Ginny came by for a few hours to undo the damage that I had done to the business’ books. There was still a steady stream of traffic through the shop, although no more vampire attacks had occurred. Phone calls, too, remained high. People wanted information. I doled out the best advice I had to offer. Late in the day, Traeger phoned. His update wasn't reassuring. Zellden's whereabouts were unknown. So were Rasputin's.

  By quitting time, I was unaccountably wound-up, antsy. I decided to catch a movie, ignoring my own oft-repeated counsel on the best defense against vampires being ‘to avoid going out alone, after dark'. Late evening was shading into the colors of true night when I walked to the Cineplex to catch a mindless entertaining action flic with plenty of superhuman feats and gratuitous sex. Because of the R-rating, I squirmed a lot in my seat.

  When it ended, I left the Cineplex in a particularly surly mood, this also due to the explicit nature of the film. I had over a dozen well-lit blocks to walk home. That was not nearly enough distance to work off all my frustrations. Especially as the night was sultry. The air was heavy and warm on my bare arms. A trickle of sweat rolled down the middle of my chest.

  "Enticing someone to lick it off. ‘'

  That thought had been someone else's, more specifically Constantine's. I glanced further along the street. There was a wooden bench, part of the city's Renaissance beautification plan that used old style turn-of-the-century benches, street lamps, and brick roadways to duplicate a by-gone era. Tonight, one of those picturesque benches was being put to time tested use. Constantine, inhumanly handsome, lounged upon it, while a gorgeous girl lounged upon him, seated in his lap, straddling him. She was very pretty, around twenty-one years old, her abundant thick brown hair fastened in a loose coil atop her head by a large tortoise-shell comb with much of it escaping in wayward tendrils, much as her abundant, voluptuous breasts seemed to be barely confined in her flimsy bra, exposed by a low cut blouse. She had on a voluminous azure skirt that fanned out about the two of them, hiding exactly what kind of contact there was between their bodies. Although outwardly their positions looked sexual, I knew that it wasn't. Nor had it been even before I had arrived.

  The girl seemed carved of stone, again in a pose resembling a sexual invitation, her back slightly arched, her breasts pushed tantalizingly near Constantine's face. Distance and darkness made his eyes seem black unreadable holes. But I could feel him watching me, rather than the girl's proffered charms. I leisurely strolled the distance which separated us, still feeling his gaze welded upon me.

  I slowed. “Have you ditched fric and frac in favor of a new friend?” I exaggeratedly glanced around for the twins, sensing they were nowhere near, nor was the other unknown henchman, the ‘safe’ presence that had occasionally guarded me. “Who is she, by the way?"

  "Natalya,” Constantine replied in a voice thick as honey.

  "It's Natalie.” The girl broke from her coma long enough to whine a complaint before falling back into a happy vampire-induced fugue state. Constantine had her floating on cloud nine, but he had not bothered to join her.

  My reaction, or rather lack of it, severely disappointed him. He had meant to provoke shock and jealously. All he got was blasé disinterest. However, if their encounter had been real, a tryst with all of the anatomically correct parts fully engaged, I would have been anything but indifferent. Try livid!

  "Sit down. Join us.” I now very clearly saw his fangs flash in a lascivious smile, prompted, no doubt, by the thought of a threesome. Not in this, or any, lifetime, buster.

  Yet, grotesquely fascinated, I actually considered his offer ... merely to sit down, not to join them in a menage a trois!

  "I wouldn't want to interrupt."

  "Damn you, woman. COME SIT WITH ME."

  His tone was too commanding. My body obeyed before my mind even realized it. Once on the bench, I could not move, no matter what mental orders I gave my legs and feet.

  My mouth, however, was a lot harder for him to control.

  "You need to stay away from me.” The words took enormous effort to say. I felt like I was trying to lie to a polygraph.

  "I have tried. Unsuccessfully.” His deeper, truer thoughts crept into my head. I cannot get you out of my mind. I can think of nothing else. You torture me.

  "And that explains this production, starring Natalya. Because you miss me?"

  "I'm Natalieee,” she whined again, before returning to her own internal paradise.

  "She is not the one I want.” Constantine's eyes, even in the dim star speckled night, shone iridescent blue, shimmering with his power, spearing me with his gaze, further immobilizing me. I was all he saw, all he looked at. And, when his hands slowly caressed up Natalie's arms, around the sides of her plump breasts, swept ever upward to stop when they encircled her slim neck, it was me who gloried at his hands, shivered at his touch, waited for his kiss, not upon the lips but upon the throat. My head fell back, exposing the vulnerable length of my neck. My eyes shuttered in that strange fashion of anticipation. And I waited.

  No exquisite pain came. That made my breath grow even more ragged. And, then, I felt Constantine raise my hand to his mouth. My eyes remained closed, savoring every sensation, as he slowly took my index finger into his mouth, sucking gently, first the tip, then down to the knuckle, and finally taking its entire length. His mouth was satiny, running up and down the length of my finger. He masterfully used his tongue, rolled it around the tip, sucked ever harder.

  But, then, he had to spoil the experience. He nipped the end of my finger.

  "Shit.” It was a quick unexpected pain. I recoiled from him, noting that a tiny drop of blood welled at that spot.

  "Why did you do that?” I was angry and hurt.

  "To prove a point.” He lounged back on the bench, confronting me with his own blazing anger. He was completely oblivious to the fact that a girl straddled him in the most intimate manner. There was only the two of us. “I used no sway upon you. You have no true moral objection to sex with me. You are not repulsed by what I am. You enjoyed this small intimacy. Admit it."

  I listened to his accusation, all-the-while wanting to soothe the small ache in my index finger by popping it into my mouth. But that wouldn't be very nice since he, being a vampire, had his total attention riveted upon me. Would it? What the hell did I care! I forcefully sucked the thick droplet of blood from the pad of my finger.

  The gesture made Constantine's eyes contract to black pinpoints.

  It was my turn to give him a leering smile. “I have never believed in casual sex."

  He gave a nasty snort. “Yet, we both know, you are not a virgin."

  "I never claimed to be. I have been involved in two serious relationships, but I have never slept around."

  Constantine's voice dropped to a low whisper. “Perhaps, since your serious relationships have failed, you should try a casual one? Just for the sex. You are a grown woman. You have needs, desires...."

  "Which you could fill?"

  "Most assuredly.” His mouth titled upwards in a smug smile.

  His arguments sounded so logical. I was single, almost thirty, and had no partner, companion, boyfriend, fiancé. If I consciously practiced safe sex, with another mature adult, what was the harm, except to my own unfulfilled Prince
Charming fantasies? I had been plagued by strong urges of late. Caused by Constantine. Who better, then, to sate them?

  But I could not throw away my romantic beliefs that easily. “Sex without love, respect, or commitment...."

  "Is a purely physical act. I can offer you every pleasure without the worry of diseases, because I have none to transmit."

  "With humans, abstinence is the best safeguard.” I gnawed at my bottom lip. Another question popped into my head, making me blush with embarrassment. I asked it anyway. “What about pregnancy?” This was a total unknown in most of the reference material I had ever read. Of course, the Von Heslings’ purported that it should be scientifically impossible (since vampires’ rarely had a viable sperm count) for any such conception, whether between two vampires, or between a vampire and a human. The Von Heslings’ should know. They were the experts. Yet I had recently come to doubt their expertise.

  "It is possible—some lore has claimed such—but most unlikely. I have existed a long time, my little Soulsmith, and never encountered such. Nor,” he slowly, reluctantly added, “have I ever fathered such."

  I heaved a sigh. “Worry free, casual sex. As much and as often as you liked to indulge yourself. Centuries worth. Has it been satisfying?"

  "Yes.” Then, however, with his eyes shuttered, he made a further admission. “At least, it has always been so until this point in time. Feel free to interpret that statement as you choose."

  "I might wish it otherwise, Constantine, but I can't offer myself that easily. Most especially to a vampire.” That last inhibition was the most unshakable. I was afraid of him, of the progenitor who ruled the night, who held sway over most of humanity, and could seduce any woman he should happen to meet.

  "Nor can I change my nature, my love, but I can control it.” His voice flowed like satin, carrying with it only a nominal spell of mesmerism, easy for me to sense and counteract, if I so chose. Which I didn't. That way I could later claim to have been compelled by him rather than by the uncharacteristic and overwhelming need to have fiendish sex ... with anyone. He continued, and his words, his tone, made my spine tingle. “I vow to never take what you would withhold. Deny me as much or as little as you choose. I will abide by your will."

  "Just sex. Nothing else. And on my terms.” I could barely get the words out. The hammering in my chest hurt dreadfully. I had agreed to sex with Constantine, with the vampire who had once, not all that long ago, roughly grabbed me to him and said that he meant to taste of me, to take me body and soul.

  I remembered, yet did not seem to care. I suddenly stumbled to my feet, causing Constantine to nearly dump Natalie on the ground in his need to detain me. I did not look back at him when I spoke. “See that she gets home safely, Constantine. That's where I'll be. Home. Waiting.” It was an evasive, roundabout way of asking him back to my place. It also gave him freedom to dine with Natalie before he did so. This way some of his hunger would be blunted. A sated vampire was less likely to sip on his bed partner, wasn't he?

  I started to run, but I couldn't escape from there fast enough. If I had been miles away, instead of only several city blocks, I would still have felt Constantine expose Natalie's throat, stretching it taut and ready, before he gently sank his sharp teeth into her warm flesh, relishing the sweet taste and the robust smell of the girl's blood. I was too attuned to him to not vicariously feel and enjoy every aspect of his ‘meal'. The perfection of Natalie's throat, her heady fragrant tasting wine, the pleasure of each and every mouthful.

  Disgusted with myself, I kept running, more like staggering, trying to outdistance the connection with him. When I could not break from him, like some cartoon character unable to break from an electric circuit, he took pity enough to finish his feast privately. And I, wanton that I had become, went home to await him, and trusted that he would not share any other intimacies with Natalie.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Chapter Seventeen

  "Invite Me In"

  At home, I nearly climbed the walls because I was so strung out with overwhelming, alien emotions. I was not acting like myself—at all! Sex had insidiously, absolutely become consuming! How could I have just let Constantine convince me that sex could ever be SAFE with him? So what if he had given his word to not force me into anything I did not want ... how trustworthy was a vampire's word of honor? How many times, in no uncertain terms, had he said that he wanted me? And not just in the biblical sense, but every part of me, blood, body, and soul. He was a progenitor. Domination came part and parcel of his makeup. Only I didn't want to be his submissive.

  Then, as a further complication, there was the prophecy of Zemaralda Draconetti. Perhaps everything Constantine did and said was to try and make it come true? Except, what if he sought to claim the power of a so-called Soulsmith, rather than to find a soul mate, a woman to love?

  What was I thinking, anyway? Love with a vampire! Utterly preposterous. Any involvement with their kind meant manipulation, coercion, mind-control. I definitely hadn't succumbed to his not-so-subtle seduction. I refused the possibility. On some level, I did match Constantine's power. Several times I had deflected his hypnotics. Then, again, maybe it was just my stubbornness that had refused to be controlled. What if that stubborn part of me had been worn down? My values certainly had been, else why would I have just invited him to my apartment for sex? All I wanted was physical gratification, like some maddened beast in heat. What had unleashed this growing casual hunger?

  I paced around my apartment, with no lights, no music, no TV, and grappled with my morals, the ones which Constantine had short-circuited. From somewhere within me, a voice, muted and unrecognizable, whispered that this coupling was inevitable. Why continue to fight? There seemed only one sane reason left ... because I feared turning into a vampire. But he surely could not compel me into that irrevocable act, my newly carnal half asserted! No, I was pretty certain he would not risk eternally possessing but also eternally alienating me, but I was far less certain that he could RESIST the attempt. Something within me knew that I would carry over enough hate and resentment against him to break any hold he sought over me. Constantine couldn't win me that way without ultimately losing me. Ergo, it was safe to let him fuck my brains out? This internal debate, waged with a newly emerged and radically different side of myself, wiped me out.

  I suddenly felt exhausted. It was after one a.m. and I was tired, depressed and more than ready for bed. So I took a quick shower, stepped into white cotton bikinis, pulled on an oversize nightshirt, but remained braless. I mentally cancelled all tryst! I did not feel amorous, only lethargic, worn out by an overabundance of emotional baggage. Now readied for bed, I did something I seldom ever did. Went to the tall French-style windows, more like floor-to-ceiling glass-paned doors, and partially opened one to peer over the narrow concrete ledge that ran around the building down into the quiet, empty street. There was no way up those steep, tightly-cemented red bricks! I did, however, keep a rolled up rope ladder for an emergency escape. With a regretful sigh, I moved away, stirring the thin curtains, trusting that a two-story climb up the side of a brick building was obstacle enough for any nocturnal visitors.

  And I lay down. And I was instantly asleep.

  I awakened as instantly. Constantine was nearby. Not on the street. Not in my room. But balanced on the thin ledge outside the window. Had he climbed the red brick façade? According to the tarnished Von Hesling canon, vampires didn't fly, but who knew for sure if they didn't? Unfortunately I had no time to ponder this disturbing idea.

  Constantine was here seeking admittance. There was now only one truly insurmountable obstacle preventing him entry. I had to actually invite him into my home, since my earlier words had implied but not actually welcomed him inside.

  I pressed back against the headboard of my bed. My heartbeat surged with distress. He was a huge, monstrous shadow against the curtains.

  "Invite me in.” He spoke softly, gently. He simply asked my permission.

&n
bsp; I shuddered, more like convulsed. That peculiar, unusual duality argued the pros and cons of my dilemma, to have sex or not to have sex, that was the question. How could I allow him in? How could I not? Why was I fighting against what I wanted? Give in. Give in, a strangeness within me chanted, the words an echo of Constantine's desires and surely due to his influence. Then, swayed by a profound craving that unfurled in my brain, I decided to exercise the seeming power I had over Constantine. We'd do things on my terms or not at all.

  "You may enter this once. With no penetration.” Take it or leave it. I had granted all that I was able.

  He had no problem accepting. A dramatic gust of wind billowed the curtains, and he was in my apartment, his tall well-formed body outlined by ambient light from the street, his muscular chest semi-exposed through his unbuttoned black shirt, his indented washboard abs apparent even in the low light. He approached with lean grace, peeling off his expensive linen shirt, tossing it down carelessly. He made no move to undo his dark trousers, although, even in the shadows of the room, he appeared to have an enormous erection. He mostly hid his other signs of excitement. Only a small amount of his inner fire, that light that kindled within him at times of stress or passion, seeped out of his eyes, but it leant his features, his skin, an unearthly beauty, a pale translucence that heightened the sculpted arrogance of his brow, nose, lips, and chin.

  I could scarcely breathe! My poor heart heaved and rolled within my chest. He, Constantine, The Great, night's beauteous raider, had entered my home ... to plunder my body!

  By now, he had reached the foot of the bed. He placed one knee upon it. Through the tumult of my mind, I noticed he was barefoot. The observation distressed me. How convenient to arrive at a rendezvous already half undressed. I sobbed, and he halted.