by K. Z. Snow
Now Jackson was taking Adin from behind, trying his damnedest to go slowly but only partially succeeding. Small dabs of pain pulsed in his neck and chest—the punctures left by Adin’s feed—and they fueled an excitement already made white hot by the movement of Adin’s body beneath his own.
The feeling was incomparable. As incomparable as the man he’d secretly wanted for ten ball-busting years. His appetite had grown so voracious, Jackson thought he would split Adin in two if he freed the full force of his long-suppressed passion. He could still feel Adin’s cushiony lips, warm and moist, as they pressed against his body, as they took a wholly unnecessary detour and plucked at his nipples. He could still feel their stiff cocks sliding against one another.
Yet, even as the sharpest arousal Jackson had ever known was beating him senseless, he tried to deny its source. It was the feed that had turned his dick from pliant flesh to stone. Having one’s skin’s pierced and blood drawn by a vampire was the most erotic experience in the world. All Jackson needed was to get off; it didn’t matter with whom. He was fucking Adin only because Adin had offered himself.
“God, you’re hard. So beautiful and so hard.” It was a woman’s voice that had spoken, low and ardent.
Adin bucked more forcefully beneath Jackson’s hips and hands. The sultry dance of lips against skin sounded in the unlit room, drifting from somewhere beneath Jackson’s angled body. He thrust deeper, his dense and aching cock gripped by muscular heat. The exquisite snugness and the gorgeous ass he held made him quiver. Fireworks showered from his abdomen to his thighs.
“I love you,” the woman whispered.
It was Celia.
“I love you, too,” Adin murmured. He was fucking her. He was fucking her while Jackson fucked him.
“I want to make you happy. My perfect man.”
“You are making me happy.”
Spinning and tumbling through the tunnel again, Jackson’s body seemed to shrink and stretch. Sights and sounds, no longer trapped in the well of his subconscious, hammered at his brain. His own soiled lusts and unsatisfied hungers. Adin’s vampiric need. A love shared…but not with him. A love into which he kept intruding but from which he would forever be excluded.
His feelings of guilt, and impotence in the face of that guilt. His longing, and impotence in the face of that longing. His cowardice. His hubris.
A slippery slope, he kept thinking. Don’t want to be on it. Enough is enough.
“Do not deviate from the path,” M’s voice cautioned.
“Go to hell.”
Jackson valued his sanity more than this goddamned nightmare-in-crystal, this precious Prism that held nothing for him but torment. His mind couldn’t take many more of these cruel assaults.
“But you invited them,” M reminded him. “And you did it because you had to.”
“Fuck you! Leave me alone!”
Through sheer force of will, he careened off onto another pathway, a tubular slice of light filled with an eerie, churning hash of sounds.
Faintly, M’s voice echoed behind him. “Not that way, Jackson. You don’t want to go that way.”
It was already too late. The light began to wane as the sounds increased. It got colder, ever colder, until it was frigidly cold. Soon Jackson was submerged in total darkness, bobbing through a buzzing void marbled with keening wails and gurgling groans. And slurping.
The sound reminded him of the river, lapping at its concrete banks. Only this one was worse, heavier, like waves moving through the thickest oil.
His feet slid out from beneath him, although he couldn’t recall walking on a solid surface. The river’s finally got me, he thought, shivering violently. At least Adin’s safe. Then he let his mind shut down. A smell more nauseating than the tanneries’ putrid miasma gripped his bowels.
A lasso tightened around his neck. Ahead, dull phosphorescence showed slabs undulating on a vast, tarry sea. Was he being reeled into it?
“Oh Jesus,” Jackson exhaled. He couldn’t give up. As his numbing hands scrabbled at his throat, trying to keep his trachea from snapping, his legs pumped like pistons, trying to drive him up and away from the infernal cesspool.
Just as he began to gain some distance, inch by torturous inch, he saw the slabs were faces, flattened and deformed into lumpy pads. Whatever sluggish slime kept them afloat slopped into their gaping mouths. The eyes were no more than filmy disks, wide with anguish.
Gradually, the horrific swamp receded. Jackson realized there was no lasso garroting him. It was his own collar that ringed his neck. Someone had grabbed his shirt and was tugging at him. As the level of light and warmth increased, he gained enough purchase to stand. But he couldn’t stay upright. His legs felt rubbery. Sinking to his knees, he sagged forward and gasped for breath.
“Damn, you’re heavy.” Adin dropped down beside him and rubbed his back.
Jackson turned to him. He clutched the front of Adin’s shirt and buried his face in it. A desire to laugh and cry, simultaneously, made his body convulse with the effort to quell both impulses. After a moment, he hesitantly looked up. His face felt wet, but he didn’t know from what. He didn’t want Adin to see him if he’d been crying.
“You were pulling me?” Jackson asked, incredulous.
“As far as I know, we’re the only two people stuck in this funhouse.”
“Where were you?”
“It was like the last time,” Adin said, wiping the moisture from Jackson’s face, smoothing back his hair. “We were sitting in that bottle of air-milk and then you were gone and then I was standing in a kind of sickly green glow with this fetid smell pressing in on me. And there you were, on your ass, like a really awkward kid going down a slide he didn’t want to go down. So I grabbed for you.”
With wonderment, Jackson trailed his fingers over the side of Adin’s face, both appreciating him and testing him for substance. He leaned forward and kissed his lover. It was an expressive kiss, driven by feelings Jackson still didn’t know how to verbalize.
“You have no idea how much I appreciate it,” he said humbly.
“I’d never let you go.” Adin’s smile radiated what he felt. “Unless you wanted me to, that is.”
Jackson continued to gaze at him. Whatever this man had been before mortality again overtook him, he was the greatest gift, the greatest blessing Jackson had ever known. And perhaps that fact lay at the bottom of his greatest fear—that the gift wasn’t fully and freely his; that he could lose it at any time. To the vampirism that hadn’t irrevocably been laid to rest. Or to Celia. Or maybe even to this crystalline hell.
Jackson suspected he was responsible for whether or not the gift would remain in his hands. He had yet to fully confront that realization. It was still wending its way up from the catacombs of his mind.
“It appears,” M said, seeming to materialize out of Adin’s back, “Mr. Swift rescued you from a nasty sojourn in the Shadowlands.”
Jackson shot a horrified look at his guide. “That was—?”
M nodded. “What you saw was only the threshold, so to speak. It gets considerably worse the further one goes…although the Shadowlands can’t be measured in terms of distance.”
Jackson looked back the way he’d come. At least, he thought he did. There was nothing to see. Direction didn’t exist in this place. No backward or forward, up or down. There were certainly no landmarks or signposts. He wondered how he’d even gotten to that dreadful portal.
“You got there because you needed to be taught a lesson,” M said. “A couple of lessons, actually. Now come with me. It’s time to repair the breach. If you reject my guidance one more time, you will be lost…and I will not come find you.”
*
They spun along what appeared to be more passages. Jackson didn’t bother trying to discern what was around him. His senses already felt battered. Moreover, intuition told him he didn’t have to be mindful of the doorways that shot past him, appearing and disappearing. They were cutting to the chase now. No more detours.
This time, Jackson and Adin held one another in a loose embrace. Neither M nor any other unseen force separated them. Whatever their destination might be, the approach was pleasant.
The destination proved more disorienting than the white space. When, instantaneously, the three travelers stopped, they were standing in the middle of a jumbled geography that wavered like a mirage. Rugged mountains rose from forests that sprang up at the edges of broad plains. The visible bodies of water ranged from streams to rivers to expansive seas.
That was Jackson’s impression, anyway. The landscape was too much like a hallucination to be comprehensible.
“This looks like an earth environment,” Adin said. He shielded his eyes as he peered around. “Only…compressed somehow. Damn, I wish all that shimmering would stop.”
Jackson felt the same way. It bothered his eyes. He and Adin stood with their arms around each other’s waist, squinting uncomfortably at the ghostly expanse.
M spoke behind them. “This realm encompasses a variety of features and terrains, because it’s home to folklore creatures from a large portion of central and eastern Europe. They’ve arranged it to suit themselves. It’s indistinct to you because you’re not part of it.”
There were creatures darting and scurrying about, from what Jackson could tell, but they, too, lacked solidity. Every form, every color kept up a relentless shimmy.
Only one feature of their surroundings was sharply defined—a bright platinum line at the horizon.
Jackson’s heart jigged as he focused on it.
“I could’ve sworn I just saw Baba Yaga fly overhead,” Adin said. He pronounced the second word yee-gar, emphasizing the second syllable.
It was enough to lever Jackson’s gaze away from the distant slash. He looked up. There was indeed a hunched crone in some kind of bowl, flying amid a small phalanx of horsemen in red, white, and black.
“I thought she’d slipped out already.”
“There are probably ten variations of Baba Yaga,” Adin said, “give or take. Different ethnic groups at different times in history put their own spins on the same legends.” He glanced at Jackson. “Hence the many ways vampires are portrayed.”
Jackson’s stomach fluttered at the mention of them. Adin continued to watch him. The most Jackson could do was give him an uneasy glance, an abbreviated nod.
“Do you want to talk about what you discovered in here?” Adin asked.
My greatest fears. The liquid, beating wings in Jackson’s stomach suddenly intertwined and congealed into a knot. “No,” he said quietly. “Not yet. It’s too soon.”
M appeared and stood beside the two human men. “I believe you’ve already noticed the split.”
“Yes,” Jackson answered.
“Where is it?” Adin asked.
Jackson jerked his thumb toward the section of horizon where the gleaming line stretched.
“Before we proceed,” M said to Jackson, “I must ask you something. When you’re released, should you be released, where would you like to go?”
The condition tacked on to the question sent a chilly current through Jackson’s body. On this occasion, control was of paramount importance. He’d be useless if he became paralyzed with dread. The enormity of the consequences was too much to contemplate.
“Home,” he said as calmly as possible. “I just want to go home. With Adin.”
“Do you have any objection?” M asked the other man.
“No, of course not. I want to be where Jackson is. I have to see this through with him.”
Still looking at M, Jackson lifted his shoulders and turned up his hands. “So now what? Am I supposed to improvise some kind of magic to stitch up the tear?” He slid his hands into his jeans pockets.
“No,” said M. “It’s much easier than that. And much more difficult.” On that ambiguous note, M carried the three of them closer to the split, floating them through the surreal landscape.
Chapter Sixteen
We were poised on a hilltop. The crack in the Prism gleamed in the distance. It was, no doubt, a menacing gleam in the eyes of my companions, but I simply saw it as a destination.
I addressed the Mender. “This will be the ultimate test of your mettle, Jackson Charlemagne Spey. And a test of other qualities, as well.”
So, I thought, it is coming to an end now. Its own unique end, inevitable and irreversible.
I had no notion of what that end would be. The Shebra’felime were not privy to such knowledge, lest they try to influence a mission’s outcome. And it was very likely we would try, if we carried our instinct for protectiveness too far. I had already fallen prey to such weakness and would be sorely tempted to aid Spey if he showed any sign of foundering.
For a fleeting moment, I allowed myself the pleasure of gazing upon both men. They were so intelligent and yet full of feeling; so complex in their interaction—as every force in the universe was, down to subatomic particles. And they continued to delight my senses.
Spey had begun to look a bit truculent. He fidgeted, probably eager to have done with the mysteries of the Prism. “I think you need to clue me in more than that,” he said. “I’ve resigned myself to tackling this job, but if my magical abilities won’t come into play, I’m at a loss.”
I understood his confusion. No Mender knew what repairing a breach entailed, and explaining that process was yet another of a Felim’s duties. “You, the Mender, must choose the cement that seals the split,” I explained. “But your choice is limited. The bonding element must be, can only be, whatever is most important to you, the one thing you consider so essential to your life that’s it is irreplaceable.”
Spey’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. “From any time in my life?”
“No,” I said, anticipating this pitiable sliver of hope. “It cannot be something from your past. It must be something you currently value above all else. Your faith, your intellect, your manhood; a particular talent; one of your senses; your social network; a parent or spouse or child. Whatever is of paramount importance is what you must relinquish and apply to the break. Other Menders, those who never returned, chose to offer their very lives rather than sacrifice that which gave their lives meaning.”
On the verge of hyperventilating, Spey blinked in rapid succession. I could read these signs, for I’d read them in others. They became evident when a Mender realized what he or she was being told to give up…and then tried desperately to determine an adequate substitute for it.
“You cannot,” I said, “offer your soul. Humans have an imperfect understanding, at best, of what the soul is. Therefore, the repair would be flawed. The significance of what you offer must be definably clear and very real to you. It cannot be vague and it cannot be of theoretical importance.”
Now, Spey began to perspire. Beads of moisture appeared in his facial hair.
“And you cannot lie,” I cautioned him. “The seal will not be effective if you equivocate, and both you and your world will suffer for it.”
“Don’t give up your magical abilities,” Swift said to him quite ardently. “You’ve worked so hard, so long—”
Spey’s head snapped in his direction. “It isn’t the fucking magic! I mastered it once; I can master it again. It isn’t irreplaceable. And even if it were, it isn’t what’s most important to me.”
The secret he'd been trying to keep, even from himself, was fully revealed to him now. The Prism's inflexible laws had smashed the locks and flung open the door. Still, Spey would not reveal it to anyone else, and certainly not here. I saw the stubborn defiance twist through his features like broken glass.
“Jackson?” Swift said. “Look at me.” He'd glimpsed the secret, too, or thought he had. He wanted confirmation.
Spey shook his head. “No. Let me think.”
“Look at me!” Swift grasped his face and forced his head to turn.
And now, another surge of feeling as their eyes met. Agony wound through Jackson’s defiance—agony prompted by the bleak realizat
ion that he cherished his lover beyond measure…and above all else.
Hands quaking, Spey cradled the other man’s face and stared into it, as if it were rarer than the very Prism that held them.
“I’d give anything to hear you say it,” Swift murmured.
Spey could not conceal the truth from him. I could almost see it pass from Jackson’s eyes to Adin’s as they gazed at one another.
Frantically, Spey shook his head. His hands lowered, and he seemed tempted the shake Adin by the shoulders. “Are you crazy? Don’t say you’d give anything. Don’t.”
“Then consider it unsaid. Just tell me what you’re thinking. I want to hear it. I need to hear it.”
I cocked my head. How very peculiar, I thought, that a man would risk his life for a string of words. Quite obviously, my understanding of humans remained imperfect.
“You already know,” Spey said, straining to refuse his lover’s fondest wish.
“Do I?” Adin touched Spey’s mouth with three fingers, grazing his mustache, his small beard. “I’ve lived for over six hundred years, Jackson, and haven’t done much to benefit anybody, except eliminate Birkett.” His implication was clear. Looking only a bit saddened, he absorbed Spey’s pain. “What matters most to me is—“
Spey’s refusal began as a strangled whisper. “No.” Repeated, it grew in intensity until the word became more than sound waves, became as solid and forceful as the blows of a mallet. “No, no, no, no! I will not sacrifice you!”
Swift’s expression changed. One word was all it took to trigger recognition. I sensed this immediately. Swift’s gaze inched away from Spey and toward me, his guide.
I couldn’t help but smile. A mind at work. Marvelous mechanism, that. Impossible not to admire. These fascinating men were exceeding my opinion of them.
“Jackson, I remember what it means,” Adin whispered, then looked back at his mate. When he spoke again, his voice was steady, confident. “Shebra’felim. It means ‘sacrificial lamb’.”
Spey’s feverish gaze swept over Adin’s face as he tried to gauge the depth of Adin’s certainty. And the depth of his own trust in it. “Are you sure?”