by Ana Calin
“Madman,” I spit through my teeth, thinking of Vlad. “Swearing eternal love to me, then locking me up like a prisoner.”
This was an abuse from his side. Keeping me locked in here, with only food and drink, excluding me from the plans he makes with the others. While I understand his reasons, this is wrong, terribly wrong. I even consider hurting the vampires guarding me, just enough so that I can escape, and I only want to escape in order to punish Vlad for what he’s doing to me through this confinement.
I hear the key card sliding through the slit, and the clicking sound specific to unlocking. Irina enters with food and drink, looking like she’s just prepared for a funeral—straight blond hair up in a shiny ponytail, no makeup, black two-piece suit. She barely raises her eyes to me as she places the food and drink on the coffee table, then she turns on her heels, ready to scurry out.
I know she won’t talk to me about Vlad’s plans no matter how much I plead, I’ve tried before. Which leaves me no choice. I tighten my lips as I make the decision, raising my chin, and squaring my shoulders. The blackness swirls to the whites of my eyes, and my blood changes. An instant later, Irina pushes the door shut with her own hand, and spins around on the spot, facing me.
The look in her face is one of shock, of course.
“Rux, what the hell—”
“I’m sorry, Irina, but you’re leaving me no choice. I need to know what Vlad has got planned, how he intends to get to the Devil’s Son, and what his next move is.”
She makes a grimace, even though I’m not causing her any pain. All I’m doing is run my power though her body, flexing her muscles like I would my own, and forcing her to stand there.
“You’re not leaving until you talk, Irina.”
“Rux, stop this while there’s still time. You’re just about to lose your best friend.”
“Friend, yes.” I walk to her, my eyes not leaving hers as I talk. “You and I have been best friends for years now, we’ve shared things and bonded on levels other women never even imagined. I never forgot that, back at the castle in Bran, you were the only vampire on my side, when all the others wanted to have me either banished or killed. You understood what I was going through, the fear, the anguish. We bonded. The one who seems to have forgotten is you. But still....”
Now right in front of her, I explore her seductress face, those catlike eyes, those fine features that seem drawn by a painter’s hand with the finest pencil.
“Vlad says that, when one becomes a vampire, their soul shines through their appearance,” I say quietly, sunken in thought. “While all vampires are extremely beautiful—with rare exceptions—their individual predominant characteristics show in their faces. For Vlad, it was brutality and war experience. For Gruia, it was cruelty. For the Old Priest, it was the ugliness of his soul. For you.” I pick a strand from her ponytail, so silky that it slides through my fingers.
“So fine, so beautiful, so alluring. On top of that, you ooze pheromones that drive men insane with desire, but I think something else at your core gives you these powers.” I look deep into her blue-grey eyes. “It’s the beauty of your soul.”
She snorts. “Me, a beautiful soul? You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Irina, even though my father Radek hurt you, and put you through emotional hell, you were still capable of becoming friends with his daughter. You protected me, you even helped me understand Vlad’s attraction to me, you gave me hope when everybody else wanted to see me lose everything. When I didn’t believe that Vlad and I had a chance. You proved your beautiful soul to me in so many ways, it’s sad you didn’t even notice it.”
I realize just how much I love this woman.
“My God, we’ve been through so much together, you and me. Even if you only count the last few days, the Red Diaz clubs, how we dealt with those men, just you and me. You are a wonderful soul, loyal and dedicated. Those who don’t see it are complete idiots.”
“Be careful,” she says, the corner of her mouth quirking up in a half smile. “Your father Radek is one of those idiots.”
“My dad always had a very special bond with mum. That’s why he was blind to you, to all women. His entire existence, he’d needed a healer.”
I keep stroking her hair, looking at it and losing myself in thought. No, I can’t do this to her, no matter what. I release her from my power, and her body relaxes instantly, as if she’s just been released from physical restraints.
“I’m sorry.” I shake my head and move away from her, to the window. I can’t look into her eyes. “I shouldn’t have done to you what Vlad is doing to me. Of course you can’t tell me what his plans are, it would expose you to his wrath. Go, if you like, and I won’t be mad. Really, I’m not just saying this.”
I stare out at the House of Parliament, truly expecting Irina to leave, and feeling ashamed of myself for how I treated her. But then I hear her steps behind me, and I swirl around with wide eyes. She has the friendly smile on her face that I’ve come to know so well.
“You know what,” she says, “I don’t think Lord Dracula would do awful things to me. The love he has for you has thawed his heart to some of us, too. I have a feeling he actually cares about Tristan and me. It won’t be easy, but he will forgive me for this one.”
Rux
ON THE NIGHT OF THE Fox Ro masked ball, Irina sneaks me out of the hotel. Vampires don’t sleep, so I had to paralyze my guardians temporarily. Unaware of how my powers have grown, and how I gained control over them, they didn’t understand what was happening to them until Irina and I were far enough from the hotel.
Now we’re changing clothes in the bathroom of a pub located nearby the ball venue. We’re crammed together inside a stall, pulling clothes out of her bag.
“No, you look better in spandex,” I say. “You take those.”
“That leaves only the fishnet stockings for you and—” She looks me up and down with meaning. “With your full ass and thighs, you’re gonna raise boners as you go. You might not make it to Geneva’s booth unfucked.”
We plan as we go, sliding into the clothes, then helping each other with the zippers and laces. We agree on the last few details as we apply makeup, finding a clean spot between the stains on the mirror.
When we walk out of there, Irina wears a spandex outfit that reminds me of Celine from Underworld—a blonde version of her, with silky long hair. She looks dangerous, too.
I’m wearing the fishnet stockings and black patent leather heels, but the red mini dress, though tight on the curves of my hips and breasts, covers me up to my neck. Like Irina said, if you show the tits, don’t show the legs, if you show the legs, don’t show the tits.
Irina wears a cat-woman mask over her eyes, while mine has feathers and glitter.
Geneva Daniel is throwing a masked ball for the Fox Ro at the Village Museum in Bucharest. It’s a highlight for the high society of Bucharest, since renting the Village museum is such a big deal. It’s a whole village in which you can find traditional houses from all over the country, most of them original, centuries old, reconditioned and furnished with original vintage items that speak of the village life of old. Think clay bowls and amphorae, hand made rugs and old wooden beds with hay-filled mattresses and pillows.
This is where the Devil’s Son will be, and where Vlad plans to get him. Now that he has the demon’s name, he also has freedom of choice regarding the method he’ll use to take the half-demon down. But after meeting the Devil’s Son, I know how well prepared he can be, and I’m afraid he’s well prepared for this confrontation.
Irina and I have our own plan in place, but we’re immediately disheartened when we see the crowd pushing towards the gates of the Village Museum.
“Fuck, just getting in will take hours,” Irina says.
I scan the crowd over people’s heads, all glittery costumes and masks. These events have become the hype years ago due to a notorious cheesy sex novel, and hasn’t died since.
Even though this is
n’t officially a sex party, I’m pretty sure the highest bidder will get the best vintage of wine and the hottest girls, and this is what Irina and I plan to bank on. We plan to get into a hut with Geneva Daniel using Irina’s pheromones.
Just like at the club in Sector 5 two days ago, there are rivers of hot girls, trying to get in. I wonder, how does a girl even stand out in the midst of so much beauty. I doubt there can ever be a ‘most beautiful’ or ‘sexiest’ one here, the variety of choice is overwhelming. I begin to grasp the drama most of these young women with hopes and dreams are actually living—their only asset is their beauty; with so much of it available, the cheapest one wins, right? These girls live a tragedy, really.
Irina and I go with the flow, holding hands tightly as the crowd squeezes us together and drifts slowly with us towards the entrance. We have no choice but wait.
There are bouncers at the gates, a dozen of them with security devices, which is what made the influx of people so slow. Irina and I must have waited forty-five minutes before we got inside.
The air is much more breathable on the other side of the village museum, because the bouncers didn’t let everybody in. Apparently many wannabe attendees were carrying weapons, which is completely forbidden in this place. Also, even though the event is open to the public if they pay a ridiculously high fee, the bouncers used every pretext to let only the fewest enter. In our case, Irina’s pheromones played the main part, it’s what got us in.
Still, all we can do for starters is go to one of the stalls—there’s a fair in the style of a traditional village Sunday fair—and get drinks. Then we walk leisurely, scanning the place and thinking of our next move.
“Not sure how we’re gonna find Geneva,” I tell Irina, my hand in hers. “We only know her from the online pictures, and she’ll be wearing a mask.” We pretend to be sauntering about, but I can’t keep the worry from my voice. We need to find Geneva in order to find the Devil’s Son, and we need to do it before Vlad does.
Vlad now has the Devil’s Son’s name, but the Devil’s Son knows it, too. No matter what Vlad, Irina, Tristan, I, and the rest of the team did until now, the half vampire half demon always landed on his feet, because he could either foresee our moves, or he has some other superpower that we don’t know about, and that gives him an advantage.
No matter what, Vlad needs my help more than he thinks.
What turns out effective in the end is, once again, Irina’s pheromones. She activates them from man to man—the V.I.P. looking ones, until we stumble over one who knows Geneva.
“She and her boyfriend like their girls in spandex,” he tells Irina with a bleached grin that hurts my eyes. I make a grimace behind my feathery mask. Why do these people have to exaggerate like this? He doesn’t even look attractive anymore, he looks like an alien.
The guy grabs Irina’s wrist, and says, “Sometimes I like partaking, you know.” I scan him up and down—pretty boy, tan and muscles. He’s the lead singer of some band, if I get him correctly. “If you behave, I could get you in tonight.”
Irina smiles seductively. “You would do that for me?”
The bleached-grin guy seems on fire. “Oh, yes.” His eyes shoot at me through the holes in his mask. “You can take your little friend with you, too.” He reaches over and slaps my butt. “I like them curvy, oh, and look at that wasp-like waist.”
I clench my teeth, but force a smile. I’m outraged, and I plan to punish him for it, but then he points to one of the huts. It’s a more isolated one, with wooden beams and a wooden porch, made of clay, thatched roof, on a small slope behind a few trees. Men in traditional peasant clothes walk around, but they must be bodyguards, ensuring that no one goes into the hut uninvited.
But the lead singer with the bleached grin must be a regular indeed, because all the bodyguards do is glance at him once, nod in greeting, and then look away.
“I’m gonna enjoy fucking both of you,” he says in my ear, while still holding Irina’s hand. It must be sad for her—her pheromones only get men insanely attracted to her sexually, but they don’t make them feel anything more than that. They don’t even necessarily want to be exclusive for the first fuck.
“I’ll take that fine ass of yours, while you lick her pussy, how about that?”
How about I send a spike of white pain through your balls right now, is what I wanna say and do, but I clench my jaw and force a smile.
“I’d like that,” I lie in a husky voice, leaning into him as we walk. “But you’d have to get me really horny beforehand. Can I tell you a secret about what makes me horny as a hell whore?”
A thrill goes through him, I can see the goose bumps on his forearm. “Anything babe.”
“Another guy fucking you in the ass first.” I send just a small string of current up his butthole, making him jump.
He looks behind like a scared rabbit, and it’s all I can do to keep from bursting into laughter.
But once we step onto the porch I become way too alert for games. This is it, this is the moment I’ll come face to face with Geneva Daniel, and I must play my cards right. I might even come face to face with the Devil’s Son again—Michael. I focus on the name, keeping it in place to use it in case I must do it sooner than I thought.
Before we step through the door inside the shady, cool room, I realize—meeting Michael again could be a good thing, or a very bad one.
CHAPTER IX
Lord Dracula
Mud-encrusted leaves crunch under my boots as I move through the gardens behind the Village Museum. Music booms from the event, the crowd preparing to plunge into a whole night of drink, drugs and casual sex. Now that I have known love so deeply, I wonder how people can be intimate with each other without the emotional involvement. I can’t imagine being intimate with a woman who isn’t Rux, the thought alone feels like betrayal, and it hurts.
The sun is going down, so I have just a short while left before I can summon the Devil’s Son.
Gruia will be here, too, after sundown, no doubt. I made sure he knows where to find me. I also planned exactly how to get the half-demon here. Having his name, it shouldn’t be hard to subdue him and offer Gruia exactly what he wants. But first, I have to make sure he’ll give me what I want.
The wind blows harder, stirring the leaves. I look in the distance at the dark clouds gathering like an army of ravenous beasts in the skies, bloated with rainwater. Soon, it’s going to get stormy and muddy in these wild gardens. I frown at the sky, certain the storm wasn’t in any weather reports. Otherwise they would have postponed the event at the Village Museum, since it’s taking place largely outdoors. The fair stalls are safely covered, and not the entire crowd has made it through the gates, but there are still too many people, and not all of them will be able to find shelter in the huts.
As soon as the last faint glow of the sun has disappeared beyond the horizon, Gruia materializes in front of me. He’s assumed the same hologram-shape that he did back at the graveyard.
“Are you sure he’s going to come?” he asks eagerly.
“He’s a half-demon, and I have his name. He must come when I summon him.”
“Ah,” he breathes, sinking his hands deeper into the sleeves of his priestly cape. “I knew you were the man for the job, Lord Dracula. For centuries, nobody even came close to discovering the Devil’s Son identity, and you did it in a matter of days.”
“Save your gratitude for my wife.”
His frame stiffens in surprise.
I grin provocatively. “She increased her powers by a lot. You’d be jealous as hell if you saw what she can do.”
“Then how come she’s not here with you?”
“Bring her along, and expose her to you and the Devil’s Son at the same time? No way. No matter how this battle ends tonight, Gruia, my wife will be safe.” I walk closer to him. I know that, normally, he’d be intimidated. But not now, because he’s protected inside his hologram-like bubble. In truth, he’s on the flipside of these gardens, and not
actually here. If he were, he’d be trembling like a chicken.
“I’ll have you know something else, too, Gruia. No matter if I live or die tonight, I will be watching over Rux from the other side. Even from hell, even if I have to overthrow Lucifer to do it. So don’t you ever try anything against her because I’ll torture you for all eternity.”
The first raindrops hit the earth, and Gruia takes distance from me, as if giving me room to do my thing and summon the half demon.
“It’s time,” he says with the joy of a fanatic. His eyes are greedy, and full of the green poison that courses through my veins. “Use the half-demon’s name and compel him to join us. And, I promise, the second before you take his life, I will free you and the other vampires of my rabies.”
Rux
MY EYES TAKE A FEW moments to adjust to the darkness inside. I have a flashback to the apartment in Sector 5, a sense of déjà vu that sends anxiety through me as I recognize the Devil’s Son.
Michael.
Sitting on the hearth in the corner of the room, dressed in a black fitted suit with an open neckline and the tie hanging loosely around his neck, he seems a relaxed young panther. I recognize him by the athletic shape of his body with those broad swimmer shoulders, and the sculpted contour of his face. But much more than that is familiar to me, more even than his energy of a vampire and half-demon.
“My God,” I whisper, not knowing if he can actually hear me or not. “You have your mother’s eyes....” I can’t control myself as I think back to the woman’s face, the face I know all too well from a painting in Bran. I looked at it quite often. He has her eyes and her hair, but those are no doubt his father’s lips.
“You, you,” Irina babbles, too. Sure, she must recognize him as well.
“I brought fresh flesh,” the bleached-grin guy says, addressing a woman sitting on a divan next to the hearth, two women flanking her. She’s heavy-set and well-dressed, clearly the boss. By the signature dyed jet-black hair and the red lipstick, she must be Geneva Daniel.
