by Irina Argo
“Now, this delectable morsel,” the auctioneer was saying, “is the kind of bloodstock that comes along only once or twice in a century. She started shifting early; our trackers were able to locate and capture her right away, and—long story short—here she is for your pleasure.”
As the auctioneer spoke, two Sekhmi in evening-wear—a male carrying an elegant dagger, and a female carrying a silver tray covered with glass vials—approached the Amiti girl.
“She’s barely eighteen, ladies and gentlemen. That’s a good three years younger than the youngest bloodstock you’ll usually come across. Look at her; she’s stunning, simply stunning, and as you can see, we’ve kept her well conditioned, in excellent health.”
The auctioneer paused as the male Hunter grasped the Amiti’s hand and held it above the tray. The girl showed no resistance, her only display of anxiety the butterfly fluttering of her thick eyelashes. He raised his other hand, and the dagger flashed in the light as with a swift motion he slit the Amiti’s palm. The dark, intoxicating scent of fresh blood filled the room as it poured into the vials.
“And her blood is”—the auctioneer held his fingertips together and kissed them with a loud smacking sound—“superb, absolutely superb. Smell it, folks. It’s luscious.” He inhaled dramatically through his nostrils. “Are you getting that hint of lilac?”
Simone’s gums began to itch and burn, and she covered her mouth with her hand so no one would see her fangs punching down. It was considered terribly rude to expose one’s fangs in public, even among other vampires. But she needn’t have worried; everyone’s attention was riveted to the stage and the blood flowing from the girl’s wound. The room vibrated with bloodlust and sexual arousal.
“This is the good stuff, ladies and gentlemen. It’s blood you’ll want to serve when you break out your best champagne, at weddings, or straight up with a few associates, to celebrate a major business acquisition.”
When all of the vials were filled, the Hunter dropped the girl’s hand, leaving it dripping by her side to pool on the stage floor, flaunting the Hunter’s status through his waste of such a precious commodity. The female Sekhmi approached Simone’s table, offering the Royal pride the first of the blood samples. Leon, Theores, and Simone each selected a vial. Knowing that all eyes were on her, Simone forced herself not to hesitate and took a small sip—and was immediately flooded with euphoria.
“For this magnificent specimen, we open the bidding at ten million U.S. dollars,” announced the auctioneer.
“Eleven! Twelve! Fourteen! Fourteen and a half!” The crowd was caught up in the bidding, each pride fighting to possess this stunning beauty.
But her physical perfection would be utterly wasted, Simone realized with a pang of grief. The girl would spend her life locked in an underground cell. Except for the human bloodstock handler who brought her food and took her blood, she’d live utterly devoid of any contact. Even the Sekhmi who purchased the right to her blood, who sat in the audience right now, devouring her with their eyes along with everyone else, would never touch her, would probably never even look at her. To do so risked being overcome by lust—or even worse, falling in love—and, in turn, increased the risk of being caught up in the moment and drinking directly from an Amiti’s vein, activating the blood-bond. All vampires were raised hearing horror stories of what happened in the blood-bond: they would lose control and surrender all their powers to the Amiti, who were born to lure and seduce them, and the Sekhmi would end up burned to ashes. These fears ensured that the Elite totally disengaged themselves from their bloodstock.
For a second, Simone allowed herself to imagine what it would be like to live as Amiti bloodstock—
“Do Amiti ever kill themselves?” The question leapt from her mouth as she glanced at Leon.
“Yes. In fact, that used to be one of our biggest problems—and a very expensive one at that. They’d lose their will to live, and we’d lose our investment.”
“But we found a very reliable solution,” Theores offered. “In the beginning, Amiti were killing themselves after only a few weeks, regardless of how well we treated them. Once they gave up trying to escape, they’d find some way to commit suicide. Now, we have a system. We keep them in isolation for a while, then give them a roomie. Placed together, they develop an affection for each other. That gives us something to threaten them with. Even if they stop caring about their own lives, they’ll behave for the sake of their loved one. If we think we have an especially stubborn case, we torture them in front of each other, so they can see firsthand that we mean business. Then we separate them again. We allow them to see each other again from time to time to reinforce the motivation. After a certain point, though, it usually stops working; they get depressed anyway and find a way to die.”
Simone struggled to suppress the gagging that suddenly clenched at her throat. “Excuse me. I need to go to the bathroom.”
She pushed out of her chair and fled from the room. On the way out, she bumped into someone’s bodyguard.
“Are you alright, miss?”
“Yes, yes, I’m fine.” Simone moved around him and was immediately stopped by Odji.
“Sim, what’s the matter?”
“Where’s the exit?” she gasped, pulling out of his hold and stumbling blindly up the stairs. “I think I drank too much—I need some fresh air.”
“This way; I’ll show you.”
Simone followed him to the front door, pushed it open and ran outside. Frantic, she stumbled into the garden, finding a spot where she could throw up in peace, without being seen from the door. Once there, she sucked in deep breaths, struggling to stay upright. She almost fell despite her efforts, but then felt Odji’s firm grip around her waist.
“What’s wrong, Simone?” He turned her to face him.
“We can’t do this! We can’t! This Amiti, this young girl, she is alive, she feels, she is not an animal, she is in pain ... ”
Shit, not only was she babbling; her self-censorship mechanism seemed to have shut down completely. Well, it was too late now. Hopefully Odji understood her situation well enough.
Odji pulled her to him and she sobbed into his shirt. After a moment, she calmed down enough to raise her eyes to his.
“Would you live like that for years, maybe centuries, enduring isolation for your loved one?”
“No.” He shook his head. “I wouldn’t.”
“Me neither.” She left it there and continued to sob. She needed to keep her mouth shut and let Odji think that she was only upset over the fate of this poor Amiti.
But Simone was afraid for her half-sister, Arianna.
Chapter 3
As recently as a year ago, Simone had been only vaguely aware that she had a half-sister. She knew that her father, Tor, had been with her mother, Istara, for a long time, and that her half-sister had been born of Istara’s union with Marcus, one of the most powerful of the Amiti, nine months after Istara had left Tor. Given that Istara had apparently abandoned Tor in favor of one of his worst enemies, it had been understandable that Tor hadn’t wanted to talk about Arianna.
But then one day Tor’s interest had abruptly changed. He’d summoned Simone to tell her that Marcus had died and that he wanted Simone to attend Marcus’s funeral in the U.S. and finally meet her half-sister. The two girls had hit it off immediately. It turned out that not only had Arianna lost her father, her only family, but he had died in a terrible accident—trapped in a fire at the hospital where he worked—and it had happened on Arianna’s twentieth birthday. Simone felt terrible that Arianna had been left with no family, especially under such dreadful circumstances, and had tried to fill that gap. Not that it had been a lot of effort; she adored Arianna. It had initially been harder for Arianna, who hadn’t been aware of Simone’s existence and then had to adjust to the idea that her half-sister was also half vampire, but the sisters’ family bonds and growing affection had transcended their differences.
As Sim
one and Arianna grew closer, Simone became increasingly troubled by what the future held for Arianna as an Amiti. Like vampires, Amiti were indistinguishable from humans until they reached full physical maturity. In their very early twenties, their identity as Amiti began to manifest: they received their gifts from the Goddess Hathor, their energy shifted dramatically, and they became identifiable to Sekhmi. In the very near future, Arianna would go through her shift, and as the Amiti Queen, she’d be an incredibly valuable commodity—literally. There was a very good chance that she’d find herself on that auction stage.
Simone also wondered about her own father’s curiosity about Arianna, which occasionally seemed a little too interested. She couldn’t even afford to worry about that, though: she’d make herself crazy trying to second-guess his motives. Besides, if he wanted Arianna, there’d be nothing she could do to stop him; he’d have gotten to her already. No, she had to assume that Tor was not a threat and focus on the danger presented by other vampires.
She had to calm down and think, or she’d be no help for Arianna.
Simone extricated herself from Odji’s grasp, got herself a moment alone under the guise of getting him to fetch her a glass of water, and walked over to the deserted swimming pool patio to let the spray of the fountains soothe her.
Think, Simone, think. You’re Arianna’s only hope. You have to come up with a plan. Right now.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a quick slither across the marble tile: a small green lizard disappeared into the grass. A distant memory flashed through her mind ... and at that moment, she knew the solution. Antar!
* * *
Simone hadn’t seen Antar for six years. He was one of several dozen abandoned immortal children her father, Tor, had adopted over the centuries. The vast majority of them were much older and therefore strangers to Simone, having left Tor's pride long ago to follow their own paths throughout the world. Of all Tor’s children, she knew only the four Sekhmi who had remained with the pride—and Antar.
Antar was a winged demon and leader of the Legacy of Tyr, a powerful organization whose members included several thousand highly trained immortal warriors of different species. The Legacy was the law enforcement arm of the Confederation of Immortals, an umbrella political body initially formed to prevent the discovery of immortals by humans. It required member species to abide by two main laws: No-Kill and No-Show. Known collectively as the Code, these rules forbid killing humans and revealing the existence of immortal powers to them. The Confederation’s role—and by extension, the Legacy’s—later expanded to encompass general protection of immortals and regulation of interspecies conflicts. The importance of all of these functions meant that the Legacy and its leader, Antar, were granted virtually unlimited power.
Simone had been infatuated with Antar for as long as she could remember. As a child, she’d followed him around and spied on him when he came to visit her father. He didn’t pay much attention to her, focusing instead on grown-up business with the King, but sometimes he’d bring her an exotic animal that he’d picked up during his travels. The gifts he chose—mostly lizards and other reptiles, and once a tarantula—were hardly romantic, but Simone had relished the attention as a kind of flirtation.
Her childhood crush had changed dramatically when she was sixteen. She’d been in the palace’s library, setting aside the materials from her French lesson and preparing to leave, when the door swung open and Antar stepped into the library.
It felt like all of the air had been sucked out of the room. It had been three years since she’d last seen him, and she was astonished by his demonic beauty. He was magnificent, towering over six and a half feet, with broad, densely defined muscles bulging in his arms and chest and unruly obsidian black hair falling loosely around his face and neck. He radiated confidence and power even to Simone, who lived surrounded by the most powerful of her species. And what most assaulted her emotions at that moment had been the combination of that power and his incredibly soulful eyes, dark brown pools filled with care and kindness, betraying the depth of his capacity for empathy.
Seeing her, Antar smiled broadly. “Hi, Sim! It's been a while since I last saw you. How’re you doing, baby?”
It had driven her absolutely apeshit, she remembered, that he called her “baby.” Even though Antar was something like five hundred years old and she was only sixteen, it didn't give him license to call her a baby. She considered herself an adult and wanted to be treated like one—especially by him.
“Did you bring me a gift?” Simone asked him, flirting.
“Of course.”
He reached into his pocket, retrieving something in his fist, then opened it like a magician. A lizard appeared in his palm. Grinning, he stepped closer to Simone and dropped the cold, slippery thing under the collar of her blouse. Her humiliation at her shrieking, wriggling reaction had transformed to fury when she finally shook it loose only to find that it was just a skillfully made toy. How had she mistaken him for being kind? She threw the lizard at Antar and ran from the library.
Later, lying in bed, unable to sleep, she replayed her reaction to seeing Antar. At the memory of his glorious body and dark, mysterious eyes, a liquid heat gathered between her legs. She felt swollen, like she might burst. Seeking relief, she covered the area with her hands, then found herself pressing and rubbing herself, imagining that it was Antar’s hand, and maybe something even more intimate. A moment later, she convulsed in an agony of pleasure, waves of heat rolling through her body, her nerves on fire.
If this could happen in her mind, him actually touching her would be unbearably pleasurable.
And with that thought, Simone decided to seduce Antar the next time he came to see Tor. So what if she had no experience with men and no one took her seriously? What mattered was that she considered herself a true predator. And she had sheer determination on her side.
Six months later, when Antar came to meet with Tor, Simone was ready for him. She’d combed through lingerie catalogs to find just the right combination, one that would leave no doubt in his mind that she was no longer a “baby”: a red silk ensemble of bikini panties, garter belt and stockings, and push-up bra edged with delicate lace, all covered—if covered was the right word—in a floor-length, sheer peignoir.
On the night after his arrival, she covered her body in scented oils, styled her hair into the mane of a lioness, and carefully applied makeup in a look that was both understated and alluring. After slipping into the lingerie and a pair of red stilettos, she surveyed her body. Stockings revealing just the right amount of creamy smooth legs: check. Lace-covered breasts lifted into perfect smooth pale mounds of succulent flesh: check. Peignoir revealing every luscious curve, every flat expanse of well-toned muscle: check. Feeling every ounce the sexy seductress, the predator, she grabbed the master key that she’d stolen earlier in the week, rushed to the palace’s guest suite, and hid in the bedroom to wait for Antar.
It was four hours before Antar returned to his suite, four hours in which her sexy, predatory persona flagged considerably. Simone was determined, but she was also easily bored. Thirty minutes in, she started flipping through the magazines on the sitting room’s coffee table. After that, she went through Antar’s few toiletries, opening caps and sniffing their contents; then, having exhausted that entertainment, she returned to the magazines and actually read them. At the dinner hour, stomach growling, she’d realized that the meeting between Antar and Tor was still going on—otherwise Antar would have returned to his suite to “freshen up” before the meal—and consoled herself with the idea that at least they wouldn’t miss her when she didn’t show up for dinner.
Finally she heard Antar’s key in the door and returned to her spot behind the bedroom door. Adrenaline surged through her, the feeling she’d had when she saw Antar in the library returning in a rush. Antar entered, then stopped, sniffing the air. “Simone, I know you're in here.”
With all the dramatic flair she could
muster, she stepped out from behind the door, the peignoir swirling around her ankles. She whispered in a husky voice, hoping that it was seductive enough, “How did you know I was here?”
Antar just cocked his head and stared at her like she was a mirage. Taking that as a good sign, Simone slowly approached him as though it was perfectly natural for her to be in his suite half naked. She was covered with goose bumps and her heart was racing so fast she thought it would explode.
Still Antar silently appraised her. She moved forward until she was standing directly in front of him. Now what? She had to say or do something—or she’d look like a fool. But neither words nor actions suggested themselves. Antar’s aura was burning her alive. She imagined wrapping her arms around his shoulders ... pulling him to her and brushing his throat with her hungry lips ... biting him lightly and holding his lips between her teeth ... indulging in his bitter-spicy, intoxicating taste.
“Simone.” His low voice reached her through the mist of her fantasies. She focused her eyes on his face. “I’m sorry, Sim, this is not going to happen.”
“Happen?” she repeated dully. The flame of her imagined mating drenched, brutally, with ice water. “Did you read my thoughts?”
“I don't need to be a mindreader. It’s written all over your face. And your ...” He trailed off, waving his hand in a gesture that she assumed referred to her outfit. Or all of her. Which, actually, would probably not have been inaccurate.
She could feel herself blush. “Am I so unattractive?” Oh, crap, did I just whine that question? She cleared her throat; hopefully the next thing she said would sound sexier.
“You are a young, exquisitely beautiful female. But there can be nothing between us.”
“Why not?” Simone felt sure there was an electric current circulating between them. Couldn’t Antar feel it? She dropped her eyes and saw proof that he did in the form of a bulge in his pants. “You can't deny that you like me.”
