by Rue Volley
With this knowledge, Castle Bran suddenly came under siege, not only by Wallachai and her faithful guard, but of other lands that no longer accepted Vlad as ruler and king. As the land burned around us, Vlad stared out his window and I lay in his bed, naked…weakened and stared at his naked form. He turned to stare at me and then walked over slowly.
“It would seem that my rule is coming to an end here, I ask that you leave with me Dorin, stay at my side.”
I laughed in my weakened state, “As what? Your meal?”
He shook his ‘no’ very slowly. He crawled onto the bed and I pushed myself backwards, but he was on me very quickly. His fangs protruding and I did not want him to feed on me anymore, “Please, just end this. End my life, Vlad. I thought I once loved you, but the person you once were is dead now and all that is left behind is this demon.”
He grinned and then licked his lip as he reached down and grabbed my cock. It stiffened in his hand as I gasped for air. He had never tried to make love to me the whole time he fed on me. I lowered my eyes as I watched his hand slowly rise and fall on my shaft. I hissed as he tightened his grip and continued to stroke me.
“Please, stop,” I said as he lowered to my cock and placed his lips to the tip of it. He pushed it inside of his mouth and I arched my back as he bit into me, the pain immediately made way for a pleasure I had never known before. It raced up my abdomen and into my chest, bringing my heartbeat to a gallop inside my chest. He sucked on me, his head going up and down in a blur as I opened my mouth and felt myself coming. He suddenly stopped as my cock twitched in his hand, aching to explode. I opened my mouth, as suddenly his lips were to my own, his tongue burying itself deep inside. Searching and passionate. Giving me everything I had always dreamed of, but now it came at such a bittersweet cost. He turned me over as if I weighed nothing to him and placed the tip of his cock to my ass. I closed my eyes as he shoved the length of himself up inside me. I cried out, but it felt so good I had no will to stop him. He thrust forward, spreading his legs and straddling my ass as his cock went in and out of me. He was slow at first and the sped up as his own orgasm started to rise in him. He growled as his nails dug into my sides and I rotated my ass. He sat up, pulling me with him and never lost his rhythm. He leaned over and bit into my side, allowing his venom to finally fill my veins. I cried out as the burning sensation coursed through me and then finally reached my heart. I dropped forward as he fucked me and then finally came into my ass. I tried to speak, but the poison was consuming me. He turned me over and crawled on top of me. He bit into his own wrist and then placed it to my lips. He cupped the back of my head and held it, telling me to drink. I refused and he jerked me up and shoved his bleeding wound into my mouth. I felt the blood hitting my tongue, setting all of my senses on fire as it raced down my throat and into my stomach. Every second changing me, I twitched, not unlike he had as his own body made way for a new life, one where he was preserved in time and his body would never decay. I knew as I had always known that this was what I had wanted. This was the ultimate dream, to have him want me forever.
Flashes of every memory in my life raced behind my eyes as his blood consumed me. It tore at the fabric of my soul and my body ached so fiercely that I could not even cry out for mercy. The pain was unlike anything I had ever experienced before. He grinned as he took his wrist from my lips and held his skin together. It mended itself as he left the bed and walked back to window. I twisted on the bed behind him as my bones shifted, muscle tore and my heartbeat became erratic. I suddenly sat up as my eyes started to fill with the blackness that consumed his own and I screamed, my last cry as human and my first as vampire.
***
Months turned into years and years turned into a century. We defeated Wallachia, imprisoned her people and ravaged her lands. Vlad was now a cannibal and everyone feared him and his rule with an iron fist. He killed at will, inviting those into the castle and then enjoying orgies and feasting upon their flesh. The skies darkened and so did my heart as I allowed him to do all of this. I stood at his side as protector, lover, and friend. I should have stopped him, but my will was weak and his gift to me would not allow me to hate him. His charm as my, now, creator was absolute. I was his Red Dragon and would forever be. That was until he invited me to the chapel one night and when I entered, I expected to see him fornicating and killing as he usually would. I looked up and I saw the black cross that now hung upside down after Vlad had renounced God and claimed himself as one. Perhaps he was, I knew he would never die. If there was indeed a God and a Devil, the devil now ruled Castle Bran and Vlad’s heart.
My thoughts stopped as I saw him standing there with a girl in front of him. She stared at me and I recognized her eyes. I started to walk towards them, picking up speed as her grin came across her face. She pulled a small blade and stabbed behind her as Vlad cried out and stumbled back from her. She turned just as I grabbed her and twisted her hand, any other time I would have heard bone cracking, but hers did not. She smiled and tossed me aside as if I weighed nothing. I hit the wall to the right and slid down it as I heard a slow clapping in the room. It echoed upward and I looked up and I saw light streaming through the colored glass, the lit up reflection of St. Dionisis, patron saint of forgiveness, staring down on me. I turned my head as a man strolled down the aisle and the woman kept her blade on Vlad. I pushed myself up and he stopped to look at me.
“Well, hello, Dorin,” he said as I tilted my head and looked him over. I had never met him before, or had I? He stopped clapping his hands and stared up at the platform where the girl and Vlad were. Vlad was on his knees and holding his hand to his side. Whatever she had stabbed him with had actually wounded him, which I did not even think was possible. The man turned to me and grinned.
“I have to say, I expected more, a better fight. I mean, you are the Red Dragon.”
I stood up straight and took a step towards him as the girl stepped up and behind Vlad. She held the blade to his throat as a small bit of blood trickled form the side of his mouth.
“My Lord?” I asked as Vlad held a hand up to me.
“Don’t…don’t,” he said as I narrowed my eyes and looked back to the man.
I walked towards him as he squared his shoulders and stared me down. “Do I know you?” I asked him as he grinned and the girl laughed behind Vlad.
“You know, this is where you were born my love,” he said as I suddenly looked at the girl and knew why she looked so familiar to me. She had the same smile as Illona, the same mischievous grin. I sucked in my breath as I ran towards them and the man reached me before I could. He spun me around and had my arm bent and up behind me before I could blink. His speed and strength twice my own.
“Stefan?” I said as he placed his knee to the center of my back and I could feel the bones straining.
“It is not Stefan, I shed that name years ago…remember? It is now Hunter and that…well that, is my queen, Vanessa. Daughter to Vlad and Illona, and my creator. I protect her above all else, but I would assume that you can understand this.”
I nodded as I watched her hold the knife steady to his throat.
“You killed my mother and tried to kill me…right father?” she asked as Vlad grinned and then his grin turned into laughter. It echoed in the large hall as Hunter held me in place.
“Your mother was a whore and demon. She stole my life and the life of Romania, she was a murderer and burns in Hell, as she should. I know I will see her again someday, as I burn beside her and accept my fate.”
Vanessa cried out as she sliced through his throat and he fell forward onto the ground. She jumped on him and flipped him over, biting into his neck and drinking him dry; he did not fight her and just accepted his long overdue retribution for all that he had done. I cried out as Hunter held me in place. Vanessa rose up, blood staining her entire mouth and dripping down the front of her. Her eyes rolled and she started to fall as Hunter let me go and was to her before she hit the ground. He touched her face and whispered
to her as I tried to stand. My arm aching and my body weak as Vlad lay dead before me.
“My Lord?” I said as I stumbled forward. Vanessa muttered something and Hunter looked up at me.
“She won’t remember this, but in bits and pieces. I ask that you accept his blood on your hands. She will not be able to accept that she killed her own father out of rage. She has memory lapses, she is not well. She was born this way with his poison in her blood. She turned me years ago to keep me at her side. I know you understand me, Dorin, you must understand loyalty and truly loving someone, protecting them above all else.”
I nodded to him as he rose and picked Vanessa up into his arms. I let him pass me by and did not even turn back to see them disappear into the night. I walked to Vlad and stared at his lifeless body. He was gone and with him, my soul. I knew he had turned into a monster and with it, so had I. I had allowed so much death and destruction and for what? For my own selfish need to be at his side? I leaned down and picked up the knife, I stared at it and saw my reflection. I looked defeated and truly I was. I held the knife out and then plunged it into my chest, the poison that Vanessa had laced it with still potent enough to do to me as it had to Vlad. I felt the sharp pain of it, but it was nothing compared to losing him and losing myself in the process. I knew I should fade in this world and my thoughts flashed to better times as I fell on my side and grabbed his lifeless hand into my own. The immortal curse started to slip from me as my vision blurred. Then, I started to feel my humanity trying its best to return to me. The tears streamed down my face as I felt true guilt and remorse for all that I had done in the name of him. I rolled onto my back and stared up at the black cross above me. I parted my lips and whispered the words I needed to say for so long.
“Please, forgive me.”
I turned my head as I could see shadows, one winged and one not. One figure started to come toward me and he leaned down over my body and placed his hand on my chest. His eyes were weathered in battle, but he was not old. His hair was blue and I tried to speak, but the words would not come as blood rose in my throat.
“Dorin, I am Gunner…would you like a chance at salvation?”
I nodded to him as he picked me up and carried me off to a new life that I would be grateful to receive….
***
I step out of the elevator into Hell and accept what I had to do. I have never paid for my sins, for those of all that I have slain, for the many I allowed Vlad to feast upon in Castle Bran. Just because I had allowed Hunter to carry Vanessa out of the chapel that day did not erase everything I had done before. Even as a Hellhound I did not feel as if my soulless body was seeking redemption. I am merely a tool to collect the demons who escape Hell. We all are, but I came here with a purpose, with a new need to save someone who had in turn saved me. I stop as I hear a voice behind me.
“The Red Dragon.”
I swallow hard and let my eyes meet his. “Hello, Lucifer,” I say as he grins and begins to walk towards me as I prepare to meet my fate, for what else? But for love, as I always imagined it to be.
Moriah
The Tale of Two Brothers
Lucifer leaned into Gunner’s ear and whispered to him. The same whisper that had been on his lips since the moment he fell into his command.
“Why do you allow me to torture you? Just accept me and I will let you rule at my side.”
Gunner closed his eyes as he hung on the cross. It was of his own doing and a simplistic punishment he allowed to happen in Hell. It was not customary for Romans to be crucified, but Gunner, also known as Marcus Brutus, felt that he deserved it. He would never feel as if redemption was possible for his own soul, not even after becoming a Hellhound and attempting to protect humanity. He was a leader in his mortal life as well as his afterlife. Perhaps this was his curse, one he had to bear, just as those crucified in Rome had to bear the weight of the cross upon their backs until they were nailed to it, as Gunner was once again. Lucifer leaned back and looked him over.
“How about a story?” he asked as Gunner fluttered his eyes open and grinned at him.
“That would be worse of a torture than even this is.”
Lucifer let his tongue flick from his mouth and it was but an inch from Gunner’s cheek.
“Have I told you the story of how we, the angels, came to earth?”
Gunner sighed, as he was not interested in hearing it …again.
“Yes….” Gunner said as Lucifer talked over him.
“NO? Oh…well then, I must tell you.”
Gunner lowered his head as Lucifer began to tell his tale, as if he was merely a witness to it all and not what he truly was…the pawn that set this game in motion.
“In times of peace, men become restless. Men who have spent their entire lives battling for land and supremacy. This may seem to be the beginning of a story played out right here on earth, but in truth, it first happened among the stars. In a time long before the existence of man, there was a world of winged warriors who knew nothing of peace until it happened to suddenly become a reality. What do you do when all you have ever known was war? What purpose would your life now hold if you had to change your entire way of thinking? Well, that is exactly what happened to the following two brothers. This is the story of El and Lucifer.”
Gunner laughed and Lucifer stopped speaking. He snapped his fingers and two minions entered the room, one carrying a large bottle of wine mixed with blood and the other, a silver tray, with Lucifer’s favorite cup on it. He looked down as the first lowered the tray, the second filled his glass to the brim and then raised the tray so that Lucifer could take the cup in his hand. He held it up and stared at it.
“I felt like that was a very theatrical beginning.”
Gunner shook his head. “You speak as if you were not even there.”
Lucifer lowered his glass as his eyes hardened and he stared up at Gunner on the cross. “That boy…the Lucifer I speak of, has long since been gone.”
Gunner swallowed as he stared down on Lucifer and he gulped his drink down. He tossed the cup and one of the minions scrambled to catch it so that it would not shatter. Lucifer would eat him it if did. Lucifer glanced at the minion as he fell to his stomach with an outstretched hand and caught it. Lucifer sighed and looked back up at Gunner.
“Now, before I was so rudely interrupted.”
Gunner closed his eyes as Lucifer’s words turned into visions, as they often did and Gunner watched on as if he was there….
Comparison is a death knell to sibling harmony.
~Elizabeth Fishel
Chapter One
Pride
“Stop!” Lucifer yelled out as his brother, El, held him in a headlock. Lucifer struggled to break free, but El’s strength had always outdone his own. El grinned as he tapped him on the arm out of desperation.
“Do you concede?” El asked him as Lucifer nodded in defeat. El let him go and he fell to the ground, rubbing his neck and scowling up at him.
“You are a dick., he said as El laughed at him. He held a hand out and Lucifer swiped it away and pushed himself up on his own. He stared him down, almost ready to go again until they both turned when they heard their father’s voice echoing from high atop the mountain.
“Sons, come,” their father said as El looked back at Lucifer and then quickly smacked him on the cheek, leaving a red mark behind. El started to run and then his two large white wings appeared and spread out above him. He took to the sky without much trouble at all as Lucifer ran after him and did the same.
El rose above the clouds as Lucifer flew as hard as he could to catch up. He had always been weaker, smaller, and El was the hero. The one who brought peace to their world after decades of war. Their planet rested in a solar system that was on the outskirts of Andromeda. Two-hundred years prior, another warring faction had tried to invade their planet for its resources. Moriah, their home planet, was rich in iron and water. These two elements ruled the universe. One gave life and one made weapons to take life
away. Both were very valuable and Moriah was the only planet in Andromeda that possessed an abundance of both. To possess them meant you had the power, and El and Lucifer’s father held it all in his hand.
El was just as his father was, strong and willing to do whatever it took to preserve Moriah for their people. Lucifer was always in his brother’s shadow, willing to learn, but unable to do as El did in time of battle. He had his mother’s gentle nature and never found his way into the Helios Guard, or better known as the “Holy Guard of Moriah.”
El looked back and grinned as he saw Lucifer closing in on him. Just as Lucifer reached him, El turned upside down and dove headfirst into the cloud bank. Lucifer yelled out as he had to do the same and followed El straight down towards the top of the mountain, to the Golden City of Light. El glanced back, his expression one of mischief as Lucifer gritted his teeth and refused to stop. They both picked up speed, wings tucked behind them as they dropped from the sky. At the last moment, El spread his wings and veered to the right, swooping down through the streets of the city. Lucifer cried out as he tried to spread his own, but the force of the wind would not allow him too. El looked back as he saw Lucifer plummet towards the ground and flew back to him faster than any human eye could detect. Lucifer covered his face with his arms just as the ground raced towards him. He moaned as El hit him from the side and flew him to safety. Once again proving his worth…and Lucifer’s weakness.
El landed, his large majestic wings slowly moving out to his sides, he had Lucifer under one arm and dropped him to the ground as his feet touched the stone beneath him. Their mother stepped out of the large golden house that stretched out to each side. It was curved to form a half-shaped horseshoe. Window after window stared down on them, room after room with no purpose but majesty. She stepped up to El and touched his face. She knelt down and lifted Lucifer’s chin, checking him over.