by Gaja J. Kos
“Teeth or vampire souls? You choose...” The god smiled and received a frown in return.
Rose curled one leg underneath her body, wrapping the other with her hands. Pressing her cheek against the raised knee, she leaned on it, swaying gently.
The wild mass of her curls fell to the side, steering clear of her view of Veles.
She fixed her stare on the god, eyes narrowed. “Why do I get the feeling they’re entwined anyway?”
“You guess correctly, srček.”
She rolled her eyes; he was still baiting her and would continue to do so for a while.
But after spending six months together, she didn’t have a hard time figuring out the god was trying to divert her attention. Or worked towards lessening his own discomfort.
More often than not, the two were connected inseparably.
“Fine,” she sighed, knowing she had no choice but to play his game. Yet she wasn’t truly annoyed.
If he needed an intro, she wasn’t going to give him too hard a time about it.
“Would the lord of the underworld be so kind as to tell this little wolfie how he got those...”
She searched for a word that would be sleazy enough to satisfy his demand, but in the end opted to throw a pillow at his head instead. The god didn’t even flinch as the soft cushion bounced off his forehead and slid over his eyes. Only the slight crunching of the impeccable, carved muscles of his abdomen gave away his stifled laughter.
“Go on, you know you wanted to say the piercingly exceptional orgasm-delivering gift of god...” His velvet voice sounded from underneath the pillow.
Rose tickled his exposed side, his body twisting as he tried to get away from her claws. “Truthfully, I wanted to say pointy toothpicks.”
In a blur, the god jumped upward, throwing Rose off-balance. He pushed her down on her back, baring the full, glorious length of his fangs.
She was still laughing at her own joke, the mock bewilderment in his eyes only making it harder for her to stop.
“My pointy toothpicks are offended.” His rich voice washed over her as he lowered his body on top of her, making her very aware of the rigid length that had begun to press between her thighs. “You’ll have to open yourself up for an apology, if you wish to remain in their good graces.”
She kissed the foolish god before he got the chance to say anything else; he leaned into her kiss, sealing her mouth with his lips. The kiss was passionate, but chaste. Despite the temptation, they both understood the need to clear up a few things first.
The fun could come later.
Much to her surprise, it was Veles who broke the kiss. He pushed his torso up just enough to take in the view of her lying underneath him.
“Well, wolfie, if you truly want to know...” he purred, tracing his thumb across her lower lip. “Like Mokoš has her descendants—which would be you—I, in a way, have mine.”
“You make it sound as if all of the vamps on Earth are your offspring.” Rose frowned, trying to bite his finger.
“Oh, no, my children would be far better looking than that bunch.” The god laughed, false horror written on his features. “The vampires came into existence by accident, and you know I don’t have those in the bedroom.”
She snarled at him, twisting her hand to tickle the tender skin on the side of his ribs. The god shot to the left, lying down on his back alongside the werewolf. He stared at the blue-painted ceiling, one arm tucked behind his neck. Yet Rose wasn’t convinced by the casual display. She knew him too well.
When he finally turned his head to face her, olive embers were dancing inside the black rims, confirming her suspicion.
“It was an accidental burst of power that brought them into existence,” the god said.
“He came home at about four,” Mrs. Barle sobbed, her husband’s arm wrapped tightly around her shoulders. “He grabbed lunch with some friends from school in Metulj.”
They were sitting in a typical upper-middle class living room. Jens and Jürgen occupied the two armchairs positioned across a small club table, opposite the couch where the couple huddled together, while Zarja stood behind the twins’ backs. A large flat-screen TV loomed on the wall behind her head, angled downward.
Her spine was stiff and her hearing tuned to pick up the first signs of the monstrosity falling down.
Although the wall mount was sturdy, Zarja’s instincts were going off.
She shuffled on her feet, feeling foolish. The grief that saturated the room could have just as easily been the culprit for her jitters.
Zarja was an enforcer, not the sympathetic one of the group. This didn’t sit too well with her.
Silently, she wished Rose had joined them; her apartment was less than fifteen minutes away from the house. And the werewolf was far better suited to deal with other individuals.
Zarja hid a groan.
It was nothing but wishful thinking. Rose had her own search to conduct—although Zarja didn’t doubt even for a moment that it was a far more pleasant one…
Forcing the tension out of her muscles, she glanced at the two figures on the couch.
She had made it to the house just after the Double J team had been invited inside, and found that the parents were surprisingly eager to work with the Black pack, offering their full cooperation. Either the twins possessed an astonishing talent for persuasion, or the couple didn’t harbor any more confidence in human law enforcement than the werewolves did. Letting her eyes drift over the blond twins, Zarja figured it must have been the latter.
“The restaurant has solid food as well as blood on the menu,” the thin, human woman explained, patting her nose with an embroidered handkerchief. “And it’s close to their school, so they go there regularly.”
Easy target, yes? If Vito’s murder was deliberate? Zarja thought, using the bond to send the message.
The werewolves still weren’t certain if the victims were chosen at random or if someone targeted the three individuals. As far as they were aware, nothing connected the murdered vampires aside from their race and the cause of death.
“How often did they eat at Metulj?” Jens asked after the mother had recovered from a new rush of sobs.
Mrs. Barle tucked a strand of her ash blonde hair behind her ear, her fingers fumbling with the low bun on the back of her head. “Two to three days a week, every week during the school year.”
“You think he was poisoned there?” Mr. Barle asked, pushing his glasses farther up his nose.
Zarja angled her head to the side. She had never seen a vampire without perfect vision before; the presence of a flaw indicated the man was turned, not born a vampire. And judging by his fifty-ish age, it was quite possible Mr. Barle had worn glasses in his human life. Zarja was aware that when one became a vampire, the person’s health and strength considerably improved, but weren’t made impeccable; however, she had never considered what it must be like if some of your less-than-perfect aspects remained. For eternity, at that.
“We cannot confirm or deny anything just yet. But we do need to establish a timeline,” she said, not a hint of her previous thoughts lingering in her words. “What happened after Vito came home?”
The husband fell silent again, leaving the answers to his distressed wife. Zarja fought the urge to growl at him to man up; he was clearly handling the situation better than the small woman sitting beside him, yet did nothing to aid her.
Mrs. Barle blew her nose, her blue-gray eyes watery as she looked at Zarja.
“He... He was very restless. I asked him if something happened at school, but Vito said everything was fine. And not in that teenage ‘I’m fine’ means ‘everything is screwed up’ way.” The woman managed a small smile, her features turning softer for a moment. “I’ve never seen him that agitated...”
The three werewolves waited for Mrs. Barle to recover, with Zarja’s dislike for the woman’s husband growing.
He should have taken some of the load off his wife’s back. But he merely remained sitti
ng stoically on the couch, only his arm that still hung around the woman’s shoulder speaking of any kind of comfort.
Maybe he was the reason behind Zarja’s unrest.
Mrs. Barle tugged at the cuffs of her floral-patterned shirt, straightening them absentmindedly. “After a while, Vito told me he felt confined, captured. He said the sensation made him feel nauseous.” She sniffled, but carried on in a weak voice. “I understood the symptoms. I have been struggling with anxiety my whole life... And now my boy was too.”
“Did he show any similar symptoms before?” Jens asked, shifting slightly in his seat.
Mrs. Barle shook her head. “He was born vampire. He was in perfect health.”
Zarja took a step closer, leaning against the back of Jürgen’s armchair. “What happened then?”
“The symptoms got worse... He had trouble breathing, couldn’t speak properly,” the woman said quietly, her hands running down the line of her trousers, flattening nonexistent wrinkles. “My husband called for an ambulance while I stayed with him, trying to get him to breathe slowly... I even gave him an ice cube to hold in his palm—it helps, you know, if your mind concentrates on a cold object. I knew the effect wouldn’t be as strong, since his perception of cold isn’t as pronounced as a human’s is, but he could still feel it...”
Mr. Barle tightened the hold around his wife’s shoulders; she curled into his body, gently sobbing while trying to regain some control. His free hand wrapped around her arms, which were now lying limp across her lap, her palms glistening with cold sweat.
“He got worse,” the vampire said after it became clear Mrs. Barle needed more time. His square features became even rougher as he thought of his son’s passing, a shadow drifting across his face. “He started convulsing, gasping for air. By the time the ambulance arrived, all they could do was call the coroner.”
His sentences were blunt, but carried a sadness so profound, Zarja finally understood why the vampire had chosen to remain quiet before, even distant.
Mr. Barle was getting closer to the verge of breaking down with every word he spoke.
“We heard about the two poisonings that happened this week. Even without an official confirmation, we knew the same sick fuck had gotten our boy,” he managed to say before he fell silent, his lips squeezed together tightly.
The werewolves waited for a few more moments, giving the parents some space. Hearing their heartbeats finally slow down, Jürgen said, “Thank you for your cooperation. We’ll be in touch. And we’ll get the sick fuck, I promise you.”
Mr. Barle gave a curt nod in reply, while his wife stood up to escort the three werewolves to the door.
Being out of the husband’s earshot, Zarja leaned closer to Mrs. Barle, capturing the woman’s fragile body in a half embrace. “We will find whoever did this, but I must ask you to do something for me as well…”
The thin woman nodded, her eyes determined beneath the watery sheen as she looked at the werewolf.
“I need you to keep an eye on your husband; I know he’s grieving, but if he rattles up the vampire community… Finding the person responsible will be much harder if we’re forced to do crowd control at the same time,” Zarja whispered, her tone as gentle as she could make it to not frighten the small woman.
But it was unnecessary; Mrs. Barle was resolute to do whatever was necessary to help the werewolves solve her son’s murder.
“I’ll do what I can,” the human answered, the look in her eyes hard. “But if something happens that I won’t be able to handle, I will call you. I won’t let blind panic give the bastard who took my son a chance to disappear.”
Chapter 8
Rose stared at Veles, waiting to see his smug grin, waiting for him to turn the conversation into some kind of joke. But he didn’t.
An odd burst of power brought the vampires into existence.
The traditional ones would throw a fit if they knew they were nothing more than a product of an accident.
Rose shook her head, the thought painting a small smile across her lips. But as fun as it was, imagining the narcissistic vampires as they learned the true meaning of their existence, the stiffness in Veles’s spine steered her away. She leaned over and placed a gentle kiss on his mouth, coating him with warmth.
The god cupped her face between his palms, his olive gaze inviting as he drank in her features.
She propped herself on her side with Veles mirroring her movement. His fingers slid up and down her exposed skin in a slow, lazy rhythm. She closed her eyes, reveling in the sensation of the god’s touch while she waited for him to begin.
“I was a wee little god when it happened.” Veles smiled, ancient memories igniting the embers in his eyes. “Well, not so little, but I hadn’t grown fully into my powers yet, and I was in the unpleasant stage of my development where I still struggled to control the ones I already possessed.”
Rose bit her lip. She a hard time visualizing a younger Veles, a version of him that wasn’t as self-assured and as powerful as the one in front of her. A snicker almost spilled from her lips at the idea of the teenage god, but she thought better of it. The jesting could wait.
“My father insisted I remained in the underworld until he deemed me evolved enough to walk on Earth. But you can imagine how well that went...” He laughed at his own confession of being a hard-ass.
That, Rose had no difficulty visualizing or believing.
She traced her fingers down the sharp line of his cheekbone and brought them down to the tip of his chin. With another kiss, she went back to lying on her side, eager to hear more.
“My abilities had been stable for a while... I got bored mingling with the souls in Velin’s realm. There is only so much death one can see before it becomes either overwhelming or painfully banal. I wanted to avoid that. I understood I would someday step into my father’s shoes, but I wanted to do so properly, not already marked by the weight of the souls I had touched.” Veles sighed, but smiled at Rose at the same time.
With the smugness stripped from him, the god was even more handsome than she had thought possible. A blush crept up her cheeks.
“I wanted to venture on Earth. My father had taken me to your realm from time to time. But those visits were short, carefully planned by him to not put people at risk with my still evolving powers, as unpredictable as they were. The excursions always happened when I was in one of my quiet phases. And since I was in one then, I believed nothing would happen if I snuck out for a little while.”
Veles looked at her with wide eyes, angling his head to one side. “See, I wasn’t all that reckless...”
Rose curled her lips at his attempt at an innocent expression. The god never took restrictions well, and the fact that he had actually stopped to take into account when he would be least dangerous to the inhabitants of Earth meant he deserved the acknowledgment that he, indeed, wasn’t all that reckless.
“It appears you had more common sense then than you do now,” she teased, receiving a fanged smile in return.
“You are not wrong, Rosalind. But you also can’t deny that you much prefer this mischievous lord than the conscientious lordling that would certainly think twice before luring a young little werewolf between the sheets.” He grinned, the look in his eyes emitting a carnal need. And just like that the lord of the underworld every descendant of Mokoš had heard of, returned.
Rose placed her hand on his chest, keeping the god at a distance. “No, no, no, explanation first.”
“Fine,” Veles groaned with faux displeasure. “Velin was away, dealing with some immortal business. I had been on my best behavior for the past few decades, so he had forgone the idea of having the simargl watch over me in his absence.”
Rose flinched at the mention of the winged wolf. That was one wound she wasn’t certain would ever heal.
“I’m sorry, srček,” the god whispered, his hand coming to rest on her cheek.
She swallowed past the tightness in her throat. “So what did the conscienti
ous lordling to?”
“Ah,” Veles sighed, tracing his hand down hre jaw before letting it fall on the mattress between them. “I could transport myself to Earth and back without Velin ever realizing I was gone. But when you’re young, plans never turn out the way you intended them to...”
Rose nodded, remembering her own childhood. She had been lucky to have had Mark by her side when her mother left to deal with pack matters. Ileana hadn’t even been away that much, but werewolf children were a handful. Even at the best of times. The amount of trouble she could have gotten herself into if the older were hadn’t been looking out for her would be staggering.
“The Earth was still sparsely populated back then, but had just begun growing in numbers. I teleported myself near a village in Istria. I still visit it sometimes, watching the landscape from afar.
“I wasn’t certain what my objective was, but I wanted to observe the humans. And I wanted to experience the sensation of the salted winds near the sea. Velin had taken me there once before, and I remembered vividly how the climate had awed me…” Veles smiled at the memory.
“I spent some time on the shore, dipping my feet in the salty water, experiencing the sun’s warmth on my skin. In those moments, I didn’t feel like the successor for the underworldly throne. It made me feel…human. Much like you do, Rosalind. You have gifted me the opportunity to experience mortal sensations. And my trip to the shore came close to offering what had now become a part of my life.
“It should have been enough. I should have abandoned the idea of people-gazing…and be grateful for the time I had spent alone with nothing but untamed nature surrounding me. But I had too much fun. I didn’t want to return to the underworld just yet.”
It wasn’t difficult for Rose to grasp the need that had driven Veles to stay.
Young werewolves have to override their instincts to roam through the woods on an almost daily basis. The task being especially difficult when in their half shifted or shifted forms, when the connection to nature was even stronger.
