S Stirling - A Taint in the Blood

A snap behind his eyes, and a rucked-up piece of Persian carpet slithered. Her foot turned under her and she fell with a jolt of pain that made his lips curl back for an instant. When she tried to scramble to her feet one leg tripped another. After the third time she lay panting, eyes wide. She was sweating with terror, and he could smell it as well as feel it sparkling like red fire through her mind. The effort not to snarl in eagerness shook him.

“You know that there is nobody outside who will not push you right back through that door? That I can keep this up as long as you try to escape? That doing this makes me”-he let the snarl show a little-“hungry? ”

Gradually she won a degree of mastery, enough to give him a quick nod.

“This is a… place of los brujos,” he said. “I’m a guest here. You’ve been given to me for… food. For blood. That’s why you and your friends were brought here. You are entirely in my power. You understand?”

Another nod.

“I won’t kill or torture or violate you. You must be quiet and obedient and after three days when we all leave… they will probably find… work for you. Other work than being… food. Until then I will protect you from the others. That is all I promise, but what I promise I will do. Get up.”

She did, cautiously after the previous three attempts. “You… you want to drink my blood?”

“Yes,” he said. “Some. Not enough to harm you.”

But I wouldn’t unless I had to. I need the strength and it would ring any number of alarm bells here if I didn’t. This is part of why I told Harvey I was reluctant. To be accepted, I must act as one of them in this way at least.

“I will not harm you otherwise. It’s the best offer you’re going to get.”

She was looking skeptical, and at his crotch. He did himself, and smiled wryly: that was a reaction he couldn’t help.

“I’m a man with a penis, not a penis with a man attached. I don’t take unwilling women.”

Which makes me, if not unique among Shadowspawn, at least highly unusual.

“The blood, for protection. Quickly!”

She nodded. He reached for her… and then she swung a shin up towards his groin in a hard vicious kick combined with an earnest thumb towards his eye. That showed rough-and-tumble experience; he was glad she didn’t have a knife. Adrian ducked under the gouge, grabbed the ankle effortlessly-her mind had telegraphed her intention half a second in advance-and used it to fling her around, staggering as she fought not to fall. Then he had her pinned, his right arm holding both of hers against her body, his left under her jaw.

“Hold… still,” he snarled, as she bucked and heaved and shrieked and tried to claw, kick and bite at the same time. “Oh, nom d’un chien noir! ”

The body writhing against his was far too stimulating. He clamped her jaw upward and struck. The incisors sliced across taut skin, and the blood boiled into his mouth. She froze with the paralysis of an initial bite; not limp or stiff, simply unresisting as he held her off the ground and drank.

Oh, God, that is good, was the first thought.

Like eating a fine rare Chateaubriand when you’d been skiing all day… … and add Madeira jus with saut?ed mushrooms and a really good C?tes du Rh?ne… … or like the floating feeling after sex, like the first stage of drunkenness in good company, like triumph. Power flowed into him; he could feel his mind uncoiling like a thing of steel and smoothly meshing gears.

Then shame. Then: But I wish I were with Ellie. This is good, but not enough to drive me mad as I feared. I can stop… now.

He did, and stepped back, licking his lips and wiping his chin, and forcing himself not to grin; the poor girl wouldn’t know it was relief at his own self-control. The impulse to strip off her clothes and throw her down on the floor and take her savagely was there too…

But no harder to resist than the instinct to kill if I am jostled. I am not my instincts; I am a man, and my mind rules them. Feeding does not turn me into a beast. That is a choice, and I choose “no.”

Cheba wobbled off and collapsed into a chair, hand to her neck.

“You… bit me,” she said wonderingly. “You are so strong, so quick… you…”

Her voice was quiet with the artificial calm that came with a feeding attack. She took the hand away and looked at the red smudge on it.

“You bit me. I could feel you drinking.”

“Yes, I bit you and drank some of your blood. I will again several times over the next few days. It will not hurt and you will be none the worse for it after a little while. What I am is not catching; you must be born so. Now don’t cause me problems!”

There was a discreet knock at the door. He opened it, and his pseudo-renfields came through, with a house servant pushing a dolly with the last of the trunks on it. The servant was blankly incurious, probably a survival trait; Guha and Farmer simply carried it through to the suite’s bedroom. When they came back Farmer gave him a smoldering look after his eyes flicked to Cheba. There was hate in it, though they’d discussed this necessity when they were briefing each other on the mission.

He wishes he could feed, Adrian thought. He has enough of the genes to want, but not enough to be satisfied if he does. Poor bastard; that’s the combination that makes for a Jeffrey Dahmer, if it’s not spotted early, if you don’t know what’s happening. But he must not let it interfere with our work!

Guha hacked him on the ankle with the toe of her boot. He screeched, cut it short as she grabbed him by the ear: “Stay in character, Jack! Last warning! Think in character! Or I’ll kill you myself.”

He nodded, took a deep breath and bowed slightly to Adrian along with his partner.

“Lay out my dinner jacket, Farmer,” he said quietly. “White tie. Guha, get the girl cleaned up. Order her a meal from the kitchens and show her where she’ll sleep-there will be bedchambers for my personal attendants.”

It would create a little gossip when the maids changed the sheets and realized he was sleeping alone, but not too much-Shadowspawn considered their private lives private.

“Find her some clothes, too. She doesn’t speak much English, but I suspect she understands more, so be cautious. And she’s pretty good at trying to kick you in the crotch while gouging out your eyes, so be cautious about that, too. Get her settled in and then dress for dinner yourselves-I’ll need you to lend me countenance later. Let’s get going.”

A couple of presentable attendants were the minimum he could sport and not be the Shadowspawn equivalent of a homeless beggar.

“Cheba,” he said, switching back to Spanish.

She was coming to life again, and looked up warily.

“This is Anjali Guha, and this man is Jack Farmer. They both speak your language”-tolerably, at least-“and they are my trusted servants. They will not harm you, but you must do as they say when I am not here.”

It was time to put in his appearance at the party.

“Excuse me,” a voice said behind her. “You dance so beautifully.”

Ellen turned and stopped her solitary drift to the music. It was the man… Shadowspawn… who’d first appeared as an owl in the killing hall, but now in a cutaway coat and white tie, trimly elegant rather than unselfconsciously naked. She met the yellow eyes…

Click. A feeling like rubber bands snapping inside her head. Emotion surged up as the doors in her mind opened.

“Shhh!” Adrian said-she could feel that it was Adrian behind the disguise.

What he calls the link. I can feel it too, now. He’s happy, and afraid, and very determined. But I didn’t realize he could be so fierce.

She clamped at her thoughts, and she could sense something helping her. He bowed over her hand and murmured: “Allow me, darling. You must not spike noticeably. Use this. Think of it and it will help you contain. And if you are read, it will collapse your memories back to the rest state.”