by E.J. Stevens
Club Nexus
By E.J. Stevens
Club Nexus
E.J. Stevens
Published by Sacred Oaks Press
Copyright 2013 E.J. Stevens
All rights reserved
Publisher’s Note
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Table of Contents
Introduction
ICED
DUSTED
JINXED
DEMONIZED
Author’s Note
Club Nexus is comprised of four short stories—Iced, Dusted, Jinxed, and Demonized. I highly recommend reading these stories in order for the most powerful, and pleasurable, reading experience.
But, of course, you can and will read these stories any which way you like. No matter how you read Club Nexus—back to front, upside down, or in a tutu—I hope you enjoy these glimpses into the paranormal nightlife of Harborsmouth.
xx,
E.J.
“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here.”
--Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
Introduction
Welcome to Club Nexus, a singular entertainment experience deep in the heart of Harborsmouth.
If you have discovered our exclusive club, then it’s likely you belong to our specialized clientele. We cater to the needs and desires of vampires, demons, faeries, both Seelie and Unseelie, and their human servants.
To ensure the privacy of our patrons, a glamour has been cast to ward our club from detection by non-paranormals. We also provide club security, both at the door and within our fine establishment.
Our well trained security staff do more than keep out unwelcome human riffraff. Due to our unique location atop crisscrossing lay lines, Club Nexus has been declared neutral ground. As such, we at Club Nexus have strict rules of conduct. Bloodshed must be consensual or the guilty parties risk punishment—death, maiming, or banishment from our club—at our security staff’s discretion.
If you do hunger to satisfy unorthodox tastes and wish to walk the tightrope of our rules, you may be interested in the services of Mr. Goodfellow. Puck is a resourceful creature who will likely be able to provide what you desire—for a price.
We do hope you enjoy your visit to Club Nexus. Whether you are in need of a drink, a special someone, or a special someone to drink, we at Club Nexus are at your service.
ICED
I blew a stray lock of hair from my eyes while running a damp cloth over the bar. The raven black curl froze at the edge of my vision, ice crystals from my breath coating it like the dust of fractured diamonds. But within seconds the damp chunk of bangs thawed from the perpetual heat of the club.
The heat was one of the many things that I despised about bartending at Club Nexus. There were places within the club that were as cold as the Unseelie court I’d once called home—they had something here to please any fae in the upper echelons of power—but those areas were off limits to all but royalty and their trusted staff. Lowly club employees, such as myself, didn’t make it past the velvet rope.
Not that a silly rope barrier would have kept me from the sweet embrace of one of the Winter Court’s icy, private booths. No, the true deterrents were the heavily armed guards—a griffin with a razor sharp beak and a boggart with a particularly nasty disposition, even for one of my dark fae brethren. I sighed and pushed the lock of hair from my face, tucking it behind one of my pointy, blue ears.
I was proud of my pointy ears, slender figure, and unusual seven foot height, for these things marked me as highborn fae. What I wasn’t so keen on was my current living situation. Once upon a time, I’d graced the halls of the Winter Court in finery spun from spider silk, my hair pinned up with late blooming roses, strands of ice crystals around my neck. Now I was bedecked in an unflattering uniform, and had to bear drunken pickup lines from lowly light fae while serving my enemies drinks and cleaning up their messes. Oh, how the mighty had fallen.
I’d been tricked into an unfavorable bargain that left me with no alternative but to work off my debt here at Club Nexus as little more than a slave.
The man who’d tricked me, a notorious Seelie fae named Puck, was little more than a pimp. He used a number of underhanded methods to hold sway over a variety of races: vamps, demons, humans, and fae. Puck ran girls through this club for sex, blood, and sport. I suppose I should count myself lucky that he’d been enamored by the idea of having an Unseelie bartender who could chill drinks with her very breath, but my position as a servant still rankled.
It was a predicament that should not have befallen one of the highborn. I gripped the dishrag tight, the dirty remains of spilled drinks dribbling down my wrist. I grimaced at the foul liquid and tossed the rag into a bucket of soapy water. Sulking wouldn’t free me from this foul job, but an ear in the right place just might.
I turned my attention to Puck, who had walked in moments before and now had his head tilted close to the ear of a vampire. They made an unlikely pair, the towheaded faerie with his smiling cherubic face and the fanged vampire coated in the dust of the grave. With the fangs of a vampire mere inches from his jugular one might worry for Puck’s safety, if you didn’t know who he really was.
No matter his appearance, Puck was no angel; his kind was worse than any demon. He was a trickster who thrived on chaos and the thrill of cheating others out of all they had, whether that meant parting them from their money, their blood, or their souls.
I moved toward the two on the pretense of feeding the small faerie who provided illumination from within a glass lantern further down the bar. I placed a scoop of honey inside a trough cut into the base of the lantern and listened.
“In the market for a short or tall ten pints?” Puck asked. “Had a new shipment of Ice in this week, so your drink can come feisty or sedate. Take your pick.”
My ears pricked at the mention of Ice—in the Winter Court we had over three thousand words for ice—but I realized that Puck was only discussing the drug he dealt to his special clientele. The drug was used to subdue humans, and was especially useful to vampires who wanted new blood slaves without the bother of convincing the mortals fairly. Not that seducing humans while using glamour to make themselves irresistible would be considered fair to most mortals, but it was a game we fae could understand. But the act of drugging their victims senseless seemed like cheating.
I wrinkled my nose and turned away. I disliked vampires and the street names for what Puck was selling. “Ten pints” was slang for humans, since that was the quantity of blood in an average adult and “Ice” was the black market drug that numbed th
e minds of its users. The discussion of Puck’s side business let me know that I’d learn nothing more of interest here. Puck was bargaining, not sharing damning secrets.
I needed to learn something I could use to gain my freedom, preferably a secret so dark that I could throw off my bonds and see the trickster bound into eternal suffering. Perhaps I’d find a way to make him my slave and let him lick my boots after a good wallow through yeti droppings. Information about drugs and blood slaves wasn’t enough; I required something truly damning.
Arms hanging at my sides, I moved back to my post and sagged against the bar. Caught up in my own self pity, I nearly missed the appearance of a woman who seemed to manifest on the stool in front of me. I reached for one of the pressed leaves we used for coasters and slid it onto the bar.
“What can I get you?” I asked.
I kept my eyes averted, studiously examining my cuticles. I’d found that it was easier to serve drinks when I didn’t pay too much attention to the customers. You never know who might stroll through our doors. I would die of shame if one of my fellow highborn recognized me here in my servitude.
I waited for the woman’s reply, but there was no answer. With a heavy sigh I glanced up to see the face that lay in shadow beneath the hood of a cloak of deep blue like the night sky. The cloak was beautiful, but the woman embraced within its folds was more remarkable still.
Ebony eyes stared from a face of pale, crystalline skin with lips the color of bruised inkberries. I knew that a kiss from those lips was just as poisonous as the bitter fruit they resembled.
“My l-l-l,” I stuttered.
My liege, I’d meant to say, but the words were frozen on my tongue—literally. The woman seated before me was none other than Queen Mab, ruler of the Unseelie court. My queen had been absent these past hundred years and now here she was in Club Nexus, and she’d frozen my lips shut tight.
“Hush, my child,” Mab said. “I am not yet ready for my whereabouts to become common knowledge. Our people have grown weak in my absence and I require your services to restore our court to its former glory. Will you assist your queen?”
I nodded, icy tears falling from my eyes to shatter on the hard surface of the bar.
“Good,” she said. “I do believe you will enjoy the task I now set before you. Puck, Oberon’s former lapdog, has been acquiring too much power in this city. Kill him quickly and quietly. I am granting you your freedom, Beryl. Do not waste this gift.”
My heart swelled. Freedom at last! It was true that I’d sought a long, painful torment for the trickster, but if the Queen of Air and Darkness willed it, then I would kill Puck quickly.
“You will not remember our conversation, of course,” she said. “My presence here in the mortal realms must not yet be revealed. But you are bound by our bargain all the same. Put down Oberon’s pet and gain your freedom.”
I blinked and rubbed my eyes, wondering why they were misted over and my cheeks were wet. Had I fallen asleep on the job? I glanced around quickly, hoping Puck hadn’t noticed. The last time I dozed off while working, he’d held my hand over an open flame. The bastard knew of my aversion to fire and taunted me with it ceaselessly. Thankfully, Puck was too busy with his diversions to notice my lapse. He was only now leaving the dance floor with a curvaceous human on his arm.
I wiped absently at the counter in front of me, trying to look busy as I studied the trickster’s new conquest. She bore multiple tattoos on her bare arms, but they didn’t look like brandings or other marks of fae ownership. Examining her face, I could see that she was wearing heavy makeup, but her eyes were still bright and alert. The human wasn’t on Ice, yet, but it wouldn’t take Puck long if he wanted her dosed. All it would take was a quick sleight of hand while ordering her a drink and she’d be another slave to add to his larder.
I could have warned her. I’d done it more than once to thwart Puck’s little games, but not tonight. I didn’t care about the fate of this weak human. I had more important things to take care of, though I wasn’t at all sure what those things were. For a moment, the room seemed to tilt on its axis and cool air whispered along my skin. I shook my head and continued wiping at the counter.
My hand hit a hard object and I looked down to see an ornate dagger in front of me. That was odd. I didn’t remember any customers sitting here who may have left this behind. My eyes slid from the weapon to Puck striding this way. I grinned wide, seeing the chance I’d been looking for. I’d always dreamed of a long, slow revenge, but at the moment the thought of killing the trickster quickly and cleanly filled me with joy. Yes, he needed to be put down. Tonight.
As Puck walked past, I tossed my dishrag over the dagger and pulled it across the bar. Once he was gone, I slipped the blade into the pocket of my apron, the ice cold handle a comfort in my sweating hand. The weapon’s sudden appearance must be a sign. I gripped the dagger tightly and slid into a nearby shadow.
My captor had gone through the door to the left of the bar and into the back storerooms. I knew what he did down below in the old wine cellars, and had learned to keep my distance from his special customers and their depravity.
But now I eyed the door with longing, wishing I had a way inside. Normally, I could make an excuse to run back for supplies, but it was a “special” night according to Puck and he’d locked the doors to all except paying guests.
One by one, vampires had been letting themselves in with newly crafted keys made of iron. I don’t know how Puck managed to convey the keys to the vampires without suffering the effects of iron poisoning, but his security paid off. There was no way a faerie could steal one of those keys and gain admittance to his special bloodsucker party.
I was still glowering at the door when the southern vampire, who’d been sitting at the bar, stood and made his way toward the back room. As he slid a key from the pocket of his leather jacket, an idea sprung into my mind and I smiled. Heart racing, I grabbed a stack of bar towels, upended the vampire’s unfinished drink on them, and hurried to his side.
“Excuse me,” I said. “Can you hold the door? I need to swap these for clean linens or Puck will have my head.”
A look of distaste crossed the vampire’s face, either at such pushy behavior by a servant or the mention of Puck, I wasn’t sure which. Maybe he was just annoyed that I’d delayed his dinner plans. Whatever the reason for his pinched expression, the vampire held the door while I scurried past, hurrying on once he’d followed me inside.
The vampire rushed past in a blur of movement, not willing to waste any more time before going below stairs. I shuddered, gripping the linens tight to my chest. The man probably already had his fangs in some poor schmuck’s neck by now.
The door clicked shut and I released a shaky breath, setting the soiled towels on top of a low stack of cardboard boxes. The vampire hadn’t bothered to switch on the lights in his hurried descent to the crypts below, and I certainly wasn’t going to turn them on. The room was dark, but my Unseelie eyes were suited to lurking in shadows and I didn’t want to alert Puck, or any of the vampires being entertained with blood and vice, to my presence.
I tiptoed to the door we’d just come through and, after placing my ear to the wood to listen for anyone approaching, bent low and blew an icy mist into the lock. When the keyhole was filled with ice, I turned toward the stairs at the back of the room.
Silently, I dodged crates and boxes, making my way across the room and down a flight of stairs. At the bottom, I could hear movement and the dry, hacking sound of a laughing vampire. Beneath it all ran a soundtrack of agony: moans, cries, and shrieks of pain or terror. I swallowed hard and pulled myself up to my full seven foot height.
Soon I would be free of this prison and though the roads to the Winter Court were sealed, I’d find a new place to live where the ones crying out in agony were Seelie fae, as it should be. I imagined Puck chained in iron and strung from one of the court’s elaborately carved balconies. How Mab would have laughed at such a sight. She always did lov
e the sweet taste of revenge.
I blinked back icy tears at the memory of my lost queen—if only she’d return to us!—and pulled the dagger from my apron. Strangely, the weapon made me feel closer to my liege.
I moved forward, but as I was about to turn the corner into the wine cellar, I heard the faint scuff of a boot on the stairs. I ducked into deeper darkness behind a rack of wine bottles, embracing the shadows as I held my breath.
Seconds later, a man in an old-fashioned waistcoat came into view. I frowned, studying the man as he descended the stairs. How had he opened the locked door above? The ice I’d frozen the lock shut with shouldn’t have melted so quickly.
Flame flickered in the man’s eyes, providing my answer. The dapper gentleman was a demon.
After surveying the room and tugging at his gloves, the demon continued on. I listened, wondering if I should make my escape before more partygoers made their way through the door and down the stairs. I dug my fingernails into my palm, trying to stem the wave of dizziness that threatened to overwhelm me. If I was discovered, Puck would take great pleasure in my punishment.
The sound of an argument and Puck’s strained voice convinced me to stay. For once, the trickster sounded worried. Plus, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had a duty to fulfill.
I pressed my lips together and crept out from behind the racks of wine, inching my way along the demon’s trail. At the first open doorway, I could hear the demon and Puck arguing. I stole a glance into the room, and jerked my head back.
A slow smile spread across my face, the upturned curve of my lips feeling odd after so many years of enslavement. The demon was circling Puck, keeping him distracted and off balance. I had no idea what their argument was about—money, a girl, a drug deal gone wrong—and I didn’t care. What I saw in that room was an opportunity.