A shiver slithered along Raven’s spine. He breathed in, filling his lungs to oxidize his gray matter. His body went numb at Chetlér’s caress. Strong, calloused and scarred fingers gripped Raven’s face hard as the wolf scraped his teeth along Raven’s jaw and pulled away. The Lycan’s big hands, hot and damp on either side of Raven’s cheeks, held him captive. Chetlér’s, presence a heartbeat between them, choked something from Raven’s bones—a distant memory he couldn’t touch, but could feel. An intimacy of long ago, another lifetime, where they had met and done this before. Chetlér’s whisky breath tingled over Raven’s skin, tinted with the tang of spicy tobacco—the type one chewed, not smoked.
They stared at each other for some time, just stood there, gazing into the other’s eyes. It was stupid, uncomfortable and suffocating. Moonlight played around them to the tune of the music coming from the hall, and blemished the sharp lines in the wolf’s ragged, hard face with different shadows as the second song ended and the third began.
Raven licked his lips. “Do you dance?”
Chetlér’s eyes narrowed, mouth pulled into a rigid line. “Never.”
“What if I decided to kiss you?” It was small, minute even, a twitch under the Lycan’s left eye that rippled down the faded scar on his left cheek, past the small flare of his nostrils, to curl at the corner of his lips before it disappeared.
“That wouldn’t be a smart thing to do.”
“Why?” Raven jarred at the wolf’s statement, and pushed forward. Those rough hands slid into his short hair. “Frightened I might bite?” He leaned closer, bringing his mouth to the Lycan’s. Raven could taste the alpha’s breath on his tongue, smell his strong musk, like a fog, enveloping him. A tear of sweat glistened on Chetlér’s brow and slithered down the side of his face. “Scared it might hurt?” Raven ghosted his lips over the alpha’s, his golden stubble scraping Raven’s chin. “Or is the Big Bad Wolf terrified he might like it?”
A rush of heated air blasted from Chetlér. His frame shook; the nerve under his eye jumped.
“Sorry.” Raven pulled back, mapping his gaze across the light-blue shirt, drenched with sweat. The beast was like a fucking fire, searing heat, and Raven didn’t mind one bit. Not only was it comforting and welcoming against the cold air, it made Chetlér’s dress shirt stick to every curve and mold of his barrel chest, his protruding nipples and his chiseled stomach.
Rugged palms slipped to Raven’s neck and squeezed, sparking a rush of light-headedness. Or perhaps the wave of dizziness was from the way those hands slipped under his jacket, caressing his sides, before the beast grabbed Raven’s hips greedily, embracing his flesh hard enough to leave bruises. A slow swallow rocked down Chetlér’s throat, moving his Adam’s apple under the labour-ridden, uneven skin.
The wolf filled the gap between them, and Raven could feel him—all of him, hard…everywhere pressing against him—and the world ended. It froze, everything bled and blurred in violent and silent eruption, as the alpha’s rough lips claimed Raven’s own. His tongue snaked in, flicking and fondling, asking for deeper entry. Against the trembling, fear infecting every cell in Raven’s body, he opened for the wolf, inviting the beast to taste him.
The magnetism of this Lycan was unreal: magical, eerie and preternatural, and yet…so painfully familiar. Raven sucked at the wolf’s breath. He could smell it on him. Taste it between his lips. Feel it on his tongue as the beast dragged Raven against him and deepened his kiss.
Raven grasped the alpha’s left bicep. Feverish, solid muscle flexed under the fabric at his touch. He snaked his left arm under Chetlér’s blazer, untucking the dress shirt from the slacks to claw into the wolf’s fiery, rock-hard flesh and mark his bare skin. His thick muscles quivered under Raven’s palm, a dense blanket of chest hair soft beneath Raven’s hand. The wolf’s body pulsated with heat that still lingered in his suit. It, too, smelled of him. Strong, masculine and fucking wild. His scent hugged every inch of him. And now Raven.
Chetlér’s taste was a poison itching through Raven’s veins, burning raw in its path, and setting a dangerous beat to Raven’s heart.
His lips were soft, but his kiss dominated the attention of Raven’s own. A chaotic fire simmered in Raven’s blood from the touch of the Lycan. His hands gentle when Raven wanted them to be hard on his waist, his breath slow and measured when Raven needed him to rasp and growl down Raven’s throat.
The wolf’s kiss was sweet in the sense that it shouldn’t have been.
Chetlér was an infection Raven wanted in his soul, an obscure heroin like no other.
“We shouldn’t do this.” Raven leaned back and buried his face against Chetlér’s neck. “My heart can’t take this much excitement,” he puffed. “A broken heart can only break so many times.” A pain sliced through Raven’s soul at his last words, for some reason his sentence held more than just a physical meaning to him. He closed his eyes, resting his cheek on the alpha’s large chest, felt the wolf breathe, heard the life pulse in his blood, and shuddered. The Lycan curled his arms around Raven, a barbaric hug holding him hard against his torso… Raven felt frightened, and protected, within the alpha’s embrace.
“We should probably get back inside,” Raven murmured and pulled away.
He stared up into Chetlér’s rigid gaze. He had such old eyes, radiant green stained with dark tendrils of gold smoke, his blond hair just long enough for his scarred fingers to swim through.
Raven smiled up at him.
Chetlér was swift as he pressed Raven to the wall again, shoved his knees apart and reached around to cup Raven’s ass, while his right hand groped Raven’s neck in a tight clutch. He lifted him, holding Raven close, and kissed him again, hard, hungry. He fucked Raven’s mouth to the point Raven tasted his own blood in the kiss while the wolf’s whiskers left their mark on Raven’s skin.
“Fuck it,” the alpha rasped, panting, and snagged Raven’s lip with his thumb and forefinger, then gritted through clenched teeth, “I’m taking you home, Detective.” Those fiery eyes were dark, glaring at him through narrowed slits.
Yet Raven couldn’t resist, “And if I refuse?”
Chetlér let go of Raven’s lip and growled protectively low… “You don’t want to do that, human… I’m not a nice beast when I’m unhappy, especially if I don’t get my way. But…” the wolf’s eyes glanced to Raven’s chest and the bulge in his slacks, “I’ll be gentle.” He stared back into Raven’s eyes. “I promise you.”
Shit, Raven grinned, “You’re so charming, Mr. Chetlér.” At the back of his mind he knew he would need to stock up on some heavy allergy meds.
The alpha smiled. Raven’s gut clenched at the handsome sight. His deep voice rattled Raven’s brain. “Call me Freshán, love.”
Belail watched from the top balcony of the left wing as Freshán Chetlér escorted Raven White back into the building. He grimaced, balling his left fist. The mutation in his right hand squealed to get free. He stared down into its gaping eye sockets, dripping sickening gore. The mutation lusted for Death to end its earthly hell, even the thing’s soul would be useless, due to the suffering it had lived through here.
Belail snarled, incinerating the creature with the simple will of his demonic power.
“I don’t understand, Master,” a soft, scared voice whiffed from his left, “shouldn’t this have altered history completely?”
Belail sneered, looking down at his dutiful pet. The boy was pale, his blond hair thin and left to the mercy of the wind slapping the strands back and forth. His frame was lanky, and his bright blue eyes tired. He needed to encourage his little human to feed more often. Belail winced at the warmth gripping his gut. If any cared, it would seem Belail was neglecting his pet. He reached out, watching the boy squeeze his eyelids tight, a shiver rocking his frame as Belail carefully trailed a talon though his pet’s hair.
“Not quite.” Belail snatched his nail away and gazed over the snow-covered city of Québec. “Mostly it only affects the events surroundi
ng the last forty-four years Bla’Gar had touched.” He knew the boy was frowning at him.
“The Whilom Arcanum, simply is; a demon offering future knowledge to their past self. Thereby they Ciylos their present being out of existence, setting a new vein for Fate to run along.
“Bla’Gar had spent two hundred years walking this earth after he was banished from Hell. I simply stepped back in time and offered him the knowledge his future-self had gained. It was his decision to roam the earth as a shadow, never to interfere with Hans’ predicament, who then would have eventually brought Seth’s father and mother to Bla’Gar years later. In that reality, he couldn’t save Seth’s father, leaving Seth’s mother to eventually take her own life because she couldn’t live without her mate. Hans had also brought Bruce to him, and Bla’Gar helping another Lycan spurred Lucas to seek him out. You know how the rest goes, pet.
“However in this current reality, Hans died at the hands of his father at the age of fourteen, which meant Bla’Gar never interfered with Seth and his parents. Seth’s mother eventually found the help she sought from a different source, however, the cost of shortening her own lifespan to save Seth’s father so he could live and raise their son, set into motion the events of the here and now. Due to the alteration in time, Bruce and Niko’s species has been completely transmuted.” Belail was shocked at the shift Destiny had taken. It's going to be a joy to watch how Niko has to deal with a cold-hearted human who hates Lycans for the sin one spilled when the wolf took Bruce’s family from him. “Niko is now the Lycan, and Bruce the human Niko deemed as his mate. Lucas on the other hand...” Belail smiled, darkness shimmering through his veins at the thought. “Lucas is a true monster, a dominating presence in the Québec crime world and black markets. Seth might have been spared from the hell Kalal-yagh had dealt him, but in this reality, if he should ever meet Lucas, the pup might not survive the moral turpitude of his own mate.
“As for Kalal-yagh, that was the only instance I allowed Bla’Gar to interfere. He’s currently taking care of him and Lydia as we speak. The precinct will get an anonymous tip off tomorrow morning, but all they’ll find is the facility burned and caved in.”
Belail’s pet stood and wrapped the gray blanket tightly around the infant in his arms.
“Why not use this Willow Arkham, to stop the events of the veil’s destruction?”
“It’s called the Whilom Arcanum, pet. The power that was used to destroy the veil transcends millennia, the events of the last forty-four years of Bla’Gar’s life on earth were miniscule in comparison. Those boys ‘responsible’ for the veil’s destruction, only completed the final acts to destroy the seals and bring the veil down, they were just the unlucky group to do it. To go that far back in the past—it would be altering history on a large, momentous scale. We’re not speaking about a simple breath of time, we are talking about going as far back as the Garden of Eden. The First and Second World Wars had a reason behind them. You for one, might not even exist, and that would mean…” Belail waved his hand, dismissing what he was about to say. “I’m not willing to make such a sacrifice... Even if it would meant the gates of Hell would be open again.”
Belail swallowed, a bitter taste as his own words ricocheted through him… It still frightened him, the King of Hell, going soft for a human who had given him the most secret treasure any King could ask for. A treasure Belail had tried to obtain for many millennia. And yet it took this average homunculi to grant him the golden key.
Love.
“I’m sorry, Master, that this had not worked out like you wanted.”
“No, but it worked out in the way I needed it to.” Belail raised the crystal shard to the moonlight, watching the gold tendrils dance within the green tourmaline.
He smiled.
He clasped the shard holding the last tendrils of Bla’Gar’s humanity in the palm of his hand, it was a sufficient amount, replacing the souls he had lost, needed to reopen the Gates of Hell, there was still plenty of work ahead of him.
“I also feel sorry for Bla’Gar, to have to watch the man he loves live a life without him…”
Belail said nothing, it was a sacrifice Bla’Gar was willing to make. He understood the consequences and was willing to live with them, it was also the reason Belail had offered to take away the last bit of humanity he had left in Bla’Gar that had given the demon his caring nature, setting him apart from the other legions. With it gone, Bla’Gar would have no desire to seek out his pet in the first place, and if it did so happen that Bla’Gar and Raven’s paths crossed in this reality, Bla’Gar would be too inhuman to act on his impulses, he might kill the krypto instead, or just let the detective be.
Belail turned as the snow started to fall heavier, his pet not far behind him.
“Why do vampires breathe?” his pet asked.
Belail took the faux-fur coat off his shoulder, held out his hand to his pet, and took the infant in exchange for the coat.
“You need air to talk don’t you?” he asked his pet, watching the boy climb into the oversized coat.
His pet looked up, a broken smile on his pale face. “Thank you, Master,” he said, his eyes lighting up as they often did when the pet got a sudden idea of brilliance. The action never ceased to amaze Belail, how something so...human could make his being feel so much emotion. “I guess if they didn’t take any breaths, they wouldn’t be able to speak?”
“Exactly, they don’t technically breathe, but pull in air in order to make words. Their heart still beats because how else would the blood they consume, move through their own bodies. They are as much humans as they are demon.”
The infant in the Belail’s arms wailed its war cry, a sour, toxic stench rent the air, enough to possibly knock a demon unconscious, and very possibly the King of Hell himself, drifted from the infant. “Jesus, I believe it gave a shit.” Belail held the squalling infant with both hands away from his body. The tiny tick fucking giggled at him.
Belail snarled when the wind whipped another whiff of that potent smell into his face. “It’s that fucking vegan shit you keep feeding him, instead of real food!” he grumbled.
His pet simply smiled. “It’s your turn to clean him.”
Belail stared at the infant, his face draining of blood. “I don’t know how to do that.”
The young boy shook his head, softly laughing, “Give him here, Dad…”
Nine months of carrying the egg inside his belly only to produce a worm, that ate and screamed and... Well, there were the times when he would tug on Belail’s beard, or when the baby boy only deemed it acceptable to stop crying once he was nestled in the crook of Belail’s arm.
Belail grinned, he was a fucking Dad! He gently handed their son over to his other father before laying a protective clawed hand on his pet’s back and escorted his family into the darkness of the night.
“And the Black Phoenix?”
Belail licked his lips, “It is something that cannot be helped. Sometimes, no matter how you alter the past, the future is set to remain, as Fate and Destiny intended it to be. The Black Phoenix will fall pregnant again by the warlock, and whatever transpires from there on out, is not our concern. It is theirs to be dealt with, when it arises.”
The End…
For now.
Author Bio
Wulf Francu Godgluck
They come to me in the night, creeping into my head. Their voices are all different, their stories all dissimilar, but they keep saying the same thing…
“Show us, tell us, bring us into your world, and make us known.”
Then I sit and they take over. They tell their tales of love, loss and sinister misfortune. Not all of them get a happy ending, but they are pleased when their part is written.
I sometimes find myself lost in my own mind; a world very similar to our own yet so different. Things don’t go bump in the night— they squeal and crawl under your skin, making you grind your teeth, and making your stomach turn over and putting your nerves on edge. Then
there’s the drama. Oh, the drama!
Wulf Francú Godgluck hails from South Africa. His work is not for the faint-hearted! In his books, you'll find... all the beasties with their nasty claws and teeth, and some you didn't even know existed.
But the monsters aren't all real.
Some live inside us. Who knows what he will make you discover about yourself, lurking in your heart, behind the closed walls of the deep, black recesses where no light penetrates?
Wulf will steal your heart and never give it back. More than likely, he'll pin it to the wall with a bobby pin and sit there sipping his tea while you writhe and squeal on the floor...
STILL sure you want to read a Wulf Godgluck book?
Proceed at your own peril.
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Neon White Season One: A Tooth, Claw and Horns Chronicle Page 28