Vampire's Soul

by Joey W. Hill

  "Vampires aren't like that?"

  Cai scoffed. "Alone is better for us. We're vicious killers, Rand." His mouth tightened, though he kept the same light, I-don't-give-a-damn tone. "Some of the vampires pretend to be civilized so they can live in the human world. Then they get surprised when they try to tear one another apart. But maybe all of us humanoids have that problem." Cai studied him. "Except one like you."

  He retrieved the meat and broth, bringing it back to Rand. "There. Put this away. Then we'll talk about our lives and feelings, the way self-respecting males do it. With a stranger and copious amounts of alcohol."

  Chapter Four

  "So how did you lose your pack, wolf?" Cai gestured with the half-empty bottle of Jack and Rand took it, indulging another long, generous swig that helped the swirling, pleasant numbness along.

  "You can finish it," the vampire said. "Had all I need."

  Rand nodded. He'd eaten the rest of the rabbit and, as the night deepened, Cai had brought out the Jack Daniels. They didn't talk about too much of import at first. Cai asked him some more about what Rand knew of vampires and servants. At first, Rand thought Cai was testing him, determining the extent of his knowledge, but the vampire's follow up questions and curiosity suggested he wasn't aware of a lot of stuff about the relationship between vampires and servants. Curious.

  The firelight got even more wavy. Rand was feeling sleepy. He could ignore the vampire's latest question, about the loss of his pack. Answering it would hurt too much. Thanks to the alcohol, maybe not quite as much as it usually did, but still. If he had to choose between a rusty knife excising his organs, or a truck running over him, backing up and doing it again, he'd tried to avoid either. He asked his own question instead.

  "Tell me why you're not hanging out with your own kind."

  "Vampires aren't pack animals." The vamp made it sound like an insult, but Rand ignored the goad.

  "Yeah, but you still usually have a servant or belong to a territory. Network or that type of thing, with others of your kind."

  "Network." Cai let out a short laugh, amused but ugly. "Your vocabulary wasn't entirely lost while you were four-legged. That's a hell of a word to describe vampire social skills. But okay. You tell me your touchy-feely sob story and I'll tell you whatever closely approximates it from my sad, wasted life. But you have to go first or no deal."

  "You"--Rand pointed at him, squinting a little--"are a miserable bastard."

  "Yeah. But I'm good at fucking. Admit it."

  Rand snorted. "So's a deodorant bottle, you lube it up enough."

  Cai chuckled, leaning back on his palms on the other side of the fire. He had his legs stretched out and ankles crossed in a far-too-appealing way. He seemed to like the jeans-only, no-shirt look. Maybe because he knew that it kept drawing Rand's attention. His laughter was genuine, though, inspiring Rand to grin at him. "Now I get it," Cai said. "You hadn't had a good deodorant bottle in months. I happened along..."

  "And I couldn't control myself." Rand nodded vigorously and drained the last of the Jack.

  "Need to take you to a sex toy store, wolf. They've made some serious improvements on that bottle idea."

  When Rand's cheeks warmed, Cai's brows lifted. "You've never?"

  "Of course not. I don't...we didn't..."

  "Ever been to a strip club?"

  "No." Sheba would have taken a strip off their hides. But it was more than that. "The noise and scents...they're unpleasant. A co-worker who didn't know what I was tried to take me once. Dirty place at an old truck stop. No windows. Closed in."

  "Ah. They've made a lot of improvements on the venue, too." Cai's gaze glittered behind the leaping flames. He was looking at Rand as if he'd told the vampire he was a virgin, but thankfully, Cai moved on. "While I nurse my bruised feelings about being equated to a toiletry item, tell me more about shifters. Beyond the fact they avoid human vices. Except for drinking."

  Rand studied the bottle. When it had been half full, the reflected firelight had danced through the remaining liquid. Becoming a wolf was where he went when he needed to grieve, so he hadn't indulged the bottle much, hadn't used that crutch. He wasn't much of a drinker, so he guessed he didn't have a good tolerance for it. The vampire was having no problems. Oh, he was acting friendly and mellow, but those sharp eyes were just as sharp. Maybe vampires didn't get drunk; they just used alcohol to take the edge off. Well, no argument with that. He kind of wished Cai had another bottle, but refused to ask.

  Start with the easier stuff, he thought to himself. He didn't have to start at all. But maybe it was the intimacy-of-strangers stuff, the alcohol, the fucking. Cai saving his life and knowing so much about him already, so fast. He knew he was going to talk. So might as well do it. He'd likely regret it.

  "Pack leaders are hetero." Rand moved his attention from the bottle to the flame. Trying to keep the images in his head to a minimum. "Just the way it is. You have to produce pups to keep the pack strong, right? And wolves just aren't... There aren't many of them like me. But I found one. Dylef. That's probably getting ahead of things, though. You don't know much about shifters."

  "Only what I know from the one I found in the forest. Clever and violent. They bleed. Stubborn as hell. Made-for-sex body when the fur goes away." Cai's gaze slid over Rand's chest and down to his genitals. "Well, when most of it goes away. I like the pelt that remains. Start with the general stuff," he added quietly, uncomfortably reinforcing Rand's own thought. "Work up to the other."

  "Not going to tell you the other." Rand lifted the bottle, remembered it was empty, set it down again. "Shifters are kind of like vampires. Most of us are born shifters. Bitten people don't shift unless they consent, are approved by a pack and are brought in to do the ritual for it. And it doesn't always take."

  Cai pursed his lips. He had a good mouth. A distracting one. "Does a born shifter come out in a litter of puppies or as a human baby?"

  "A litter." Rand nodded at his expression of surprise. "Once the female conceives, she can stay in human form for a little while, but eventually she has to shift. She'll stay a wolf through their birth and weaning. The pack remains close, in either form, during that time, because she's unable to defend herself without risking the pregnancy. Maybe because of the mix of anatomy, it's hard to carry a shifter litter to full term. About one out of every five conceptions results in a litter, and most often it's the alpha male and female in a pack who manage it."

  He shrugged at Cai's curious look. "No idea why, but wolf wolves--"

  "Is that the official term for wolves that aren't shifters?"

  "Not officially." Rand ignored Cai's smirk. "Shut up if you want me to tell you. Non-shifter wolves usually only have one breeding pair per pack, and it's the alpha male and female. They lose about sixty percent of their litters to starvation or predators."

  Not being able to supply food for his family. That was a problem he hadn't had. Before...everything that had happened, he'd thought about the non-shifter wolves, and how awful it would be to have a pup die merely because you weren't fast enough, couldn't find enough game...

  "I guess that's part of why shifters have been able to stay so invisible. Low population." Cai's voice drew him away from that darkness. Rand focused on the vampire, saw the blue eyes watching him, watching him deep. But not in a mean way.

  "Yeah." Rand resumed his explanation. "When she shifts back to human is when the pups shift to human for the first time."

  At Cai's fascinated expression, the corner of Rand's mouth tugged up. "You know how some mothers don't want to give up on breast feeding? Well, the wolf version of that is the mother wolf who holds off on that first shift as long as possible. Part of it is because it's hugely stressful. The babies have no control over it. It's a compulsion that hits them when the mother shifts that first time. One moment they're a wolf puppy, the next, they're a human baby, a few months old. If the pups are healthy, it's rarely fatal, but for the first couple days they're pretty freaked out and need a lot
of attention."

  "I'd think it would be the mother who would be freaked out, suddenly having a volleyball team of human babies."

  Rand chuckled. "We don't have more than three or four in a litter, but that's still a lot. It's why having pack members is critical at that time. When she does the shift, the event is planned. All hands are on deck to help with the transition. There's a celebration. Like a birthday party for the pups, an accolade to the mother and her mate. The pups are communally raised. Which is good. It means everyone gets a chance to be parents, even if they can't conceive or bring a litter to term."

  "So when do they shift back to wolves again?" Cai asked. His questions about less personal aspects of Rand's life was giving Rand more space to breathe. Maybe he didn't have to talk about the other stuff. He laid his spinning head back on the tree behind him.

  "About five years old. They shift back and forth with no control, which means they're closely monitored until they get a handle on it. That happens around puberty. Most pups are home schooled until they reach their teens. Until then, stress or unpleasant emotion can flip the switch." Rand pushed that thought away, again avoiding the dark chasm that waited beyond it.

  "Once they learn control, what's to stop them from doing it to impress their human friends? They're still teenagers."

  "Yes, but far more mature than kids at that age. If you think about it, a non-shifter wolf lives to be somewhere between ten and eighteen, depending on how tough life is on them. While we have a human's longevity, there's a certain level of accelerated maturation for pups. A thirteen-year-old shifter is about a decade ahead of their human counterparts, at least in impulse control. The bond with the parents is also extremely strong. They defer to them on all decisions until they're old enough to establish an adult role in the pack."

  "Ah." Cai shifted, lacing his fingers behind his head. Bare-chested and bathed by firelight, it increased the distraction effect. Things probably weren't helped by Rand's nakedness, where every reaction he had to the vampire was all the more noticeable. But Cai hadn't offered him clothes, and seemed to prefer him like this, another unsettling message.

  Rand's mouth was dryer than it should be. Cai must be hearing Rand's thoughts, but his expression gave nothing away. Holding the upper hand. The vampire was just dominant by nature. He didn't really understand the significance of it, the gravity that attended such dominance. Which was why Rand resented his own reaction to it, the craving it opened in him. He was craving an illusion, and his brain was too fogged by grief and alcohol to care.

  "Want to come sit over here?" Cai asked.

  Rand shook his head. "Time for you to tell your sob story."

  "Let me get a few more details of yours. Mine's boring."

  "You're avoiding."

  "Maybe. But I find you far more interesting than me. Where were you born?"

  Rand gave him a look, but relented. It was an easier question. "Colorado. Lost my parents early, car crash. But the new alpha of the pack, my father's beta Sylvan, did okay for a while. He had Sheba, his alpha female, and she was tough as nails. Dylef was accepted into the pack soon after that. He had left a pack in Washington state when there was a change of leadership. I met him one night on a run in the forest."

  Rand paused, remembering it. He liked to run on his own at times, and that had been one of them. When the unfamiliar scent crossed his path, he tracked it. Dylef had shifted to human, and was bathing in a deep-water creek, the noise and wind direction masking Rand's approach.

  Dylef had a wolf tattoo that stretched across the broadest part of his back. If Rand closed his eyes, he could almost reach out, trail his fingers along it like he had then, for he'd shifted, too. Come slowly into the water, the two of them staring at one another, knowing. As rare as shifters were, what they were--male wolves who preferred males--was even rarer. It didn't make Rand desperate. He had had hookups with human males to take the edge off, but inhaling the scent of a fellow wolf who looked at him with sexual interest, the way he looked right back at him...

  His instincts had led him. He'd drawn closer, stood before Dylef, met his gaze. Dylef had not spoken, but after some long, weighted moments, punctuated by the sounds of the creek, the wind and the birdsong, he'd averted his gray eyes just enough, dipped his head. Rand had leaned in, pressed his nose to his crown, inhaled. Dylef had dark blond hair, a little long, and it tickled Rand's nose. He liked everything he smelled, and he let his mouth drift to his ear, nipped there, nipped the neck. Nudged him so he turned, so Rand could trail his fingers down his back. Over the tattoo.

  Then, with a tilt of his head and playful flash of his eye, Dylef bolted from the water, shifting beautifully into a silver and white wolf. Rand had leaped after him, and the chase, the beginning...had begun.

  He'd been quiet for a while, he realized. The crickets were chirping, the fire making its soft crackling, popping noise. It had been warm for a fire tonight, but the vampire seemed to like having one and Rand didn't object to the ambient light.

  "Then Grey came in." He should have left it there, but something brought forth the words.

  "Grey? His parents stretched themselves on that name. I guess Wolfgang was taken."

  "Yeah." But Rand didn't smile. He turned the bottle in his hands, watching the firelight get captured and released by the glass.

  "Grey came from an urban pack. They're a different, harder breed, less connected to the land, stronger footholds in human culture. He'd been run out of there by a stronger alpha. Well, a stronger alpha and a team of betas that knew he was bad news. He was tossed out with three or four male wolves who became his betas. Big, mean. Street smart. If they were the weaker members of the pack, I'd never want to meet the alpha, though I applaud his decision to kick Grey's ass out. Just wish he'd killed him instead, but I guess even the urbans have a strong code on that. There aren't enough of us to be killing one another over anything less than the gravest offenses. At that time, I guess Grey hadn't crossed that line."

  "Too bad you can't kill someone for future crimes, right?"

  Rand's gaze shifted to Cai. He wasn't surprised the vampire was already putting it together. It wasn't a hard story to follow, or even all that unique of one. Didn't make the pain any less.

  "Grey challenged Sylvan. When he beat him, he didn't accept Sylvan's capitulation." Rand shook his head. "We didn't see it coming. We'd let ourselves become too complacent, expecting all wolves to respect our pack rules, no matter where they came from. He killed Sylvan, and then ordered his betas to take out Sylvan's pups. Four six-year-old kids."

  Rand's jaw hardened. "In the wild, wolves, lions, certain pack animals like that, will kill the pups of the dominant female to put her back into heat, after they run off or take out the male. Don't know if he was so messed up he thought that was what he was doing, but nobody was going to stand for that.

  "We all fought them, including Sheba. Others in the pack formed a rear guard, helped Sheba and her pups get away. Because of the age of the kids, she needed at least a couple of pack members to escape with her, provide ongoing protection. That ended up being me and Dylef. It was a brutal fight, but we got lucky. None of the pups were harmed, though several of the pack were badly wounded, helping us get free. We heard later the rest of them scattered."

  He looked into the darkness of the forest. He could shift and run. Just run and leave all this behind. He didn't know what the alcohol would do in his wolf's system, but he didn't really care.

  "Hey." He turned his head. How had the vampire moved next to him without him noticing? Cai slid Rand's hair over his shoulder, his strong hand stroking tense muscles. He nudged beneath Rand's chin, his mouth landing on Rand's pulse to suck and nip. Rand's hand on the empty bottle tightened, his head dropping all the way back. Too late, he realized it would be interpreted as an act of submission. Rand wanted to shove him away, but Cai caught his hand, interlacing their fingers. "Tell the rest of it," the vampire murmured.

  "Not like this. Let this...just be this." Ra
nd closed his eyes as Cai's tongue teased him, down to his collar bone. He let go of the bottle to lift his hand, stroke it over the vampire's short hair. His touch drifted to the top point of Cai's spine, his back, over that sunburst set of scars, as Cai worked his way down his chest, his abdomen. Rand eased back to a reclining position, resting his upper body on his elbows.

  "Your propensity for being naked when you shift is very useful. And yes, fucking distracting," Cai noted, before his mouth closed over Rand's cock, and went all the way to the root. It was an impressive accomplishment, since Rand was on the way to being fully hard. The vampire's grip moved, one hand resting on the base of Rand's throat, a touch to admonish him to stillness. The other wrapped around his cock as Cai went after it with a singular intensity that had Rand shoving up into his hold, strangling on a gasp.

  No time for the thoughts of loss to completely flee before they were drowning in sexual desire, an unsettling mix that tore things open in his chest. "Stop...Cai."

  Did the vampire think that it would help, that somehow sex could shove the other out of the way? The loss of love and family, of connection. The only way someone could think that was if that someone had never actually had those things. The thought flitted through Rand's mind, a revelation about the vampire, but too much of his own personal crap was swamping him to hold onto it.

  So long, too long since he'd been worked over like this. And Dylef, blessed Dylef, it'd been more of a give and take between them, though Rand was top most of the time.

  Cai lifted his head and brushed lips that smelled and tasted like Rand's musk against him. He settled back on an elbow, too, but he was leaning over Rand so he could keep his hand on Rand's chest, playing in the gleaming hair there. Rand guessed Cai liked it so much because vampires were hairless below the neck. The contrast seemed to please him. "So keep going," Cai said, though his eyes slid to Rand's cock, hard and high on his belly. "Tell me all of it and I'll finish what I started."

  The arousal had been goaded by Cai's touch, by his looks, by the experience they'd had earlier. But at those words, desire left Rand. The hard fist already squeezing him below the ribs increased its reach, bringing his heart into it. Rand rolled away and rose, staring down at Cai.