Crimson, Volume 1

by Sax Alexander

  He tore open her shirt and she felt the rushing cold from the door that was still open. Her breasts, heavy and tight from the chill, threatened to spill out now that only the new white bra held them up and back. She hung on the nape of his neck to keep his face close. There was a shiver in his eager kisses, as if he were struggling with a darker behavior. Of course. They ate people like her. They ate people. A tune of fear sung along her spine to slightly dilute the building blindness of primal want for rapture. It wasn’t enough to stop her from reaching down between them.

  Embrell groaned when she slid her touch past the waist of his slacks and inside his underwear. He was hot and sluggish to her touch. Being partially hardened was a compliment to her, or that’s how she took it when she pumped it behind layers of cloth. It felt like trouble in her grip, with its already frightening, pulsing girth increasing by her restrained play. Of course, self preservation hadn’t gotten her this far.

  “How will it be?” she asked him. The answer wouldn’t matter. His voice was on her cheek and at her ear.

  “Between dragons and people? Of course it’ll be like in the fairy tales...” It made everything quiver. When he pulled her skirt apart she couldn’t recall him dealing with the zipper. He felt like an alloy of stone and skin underneath her searching fingers that slid his jacket off. So much warmth. His hands clawed at her ass, pushed the dark lace into a rumpled line between her buttocks, uncomfortable and intrusive in the most heated of ways. It made her kiss him harder, undo his shirt faster. Something inside him was furious, but he still treated her quite tenderly when he pushed at her. She had to spread her legs more around him to fit his bulge against the tip of her hips. It made her gasp. He felt warm through all the layers of clothes between them. Hard, as if she could rest on his cock like this, if he let her go.

  ***

  Embrell was sure she felt the conflict. He wasn’t supposed to drink from the vessels Okin had chosen. But he wanted her, was pulled by her reactions. Perhaps it wasn’t his decision to have her body anymore, but he should be able to avoid biting her, even while drowning in the smoke of lust. He ventured on the lesser treason and let one of her legs go.

  ***

  Elise gasped on his mouth when his hand left her. It returned between them to part the lace and her burning flesh. His fingers searched over her small garden of dark hair before they curled into a caress on her sex. Precise touch, even in this chaos, and it made her shiver and disbelieve the situation. The door was open, but the horror it brought was disintegrated by the belly of his finger pushing up to divide her outermost folds. She moaned shamelessly and kissed him hard, clung to his face. It was incentive enough for Embrell to bend that finger, slide it into her. She took it easily with all the frustration she’d felt today.

  He slid it around at first, circles, stirring her. It was exciting, daunting, excruciating. A whirlwind upward into her stomach. Signals out to the rest of her. Elise was too proud to beg, still. Her hips reacted without her allowance, pushing down on the digit. He had all the responses of a male. She thought she could recognize pride in his being. Perhaps a slight inflation of his chest and straightening of his neck. So somewhere behind the ivory surface and dragon blood, they were men? She knew how to coax men. Elise rode his finger, trusted the strength in his other arm to keep her against the poor mirror. A perfect storm of things to be careful of; further breaking of the silver plane behind her, the open door, the monster against her. Pain, exposure, death — and she didn’t want any of it to go away.

  She reached between them again, as if there was space to do so. Unzipping him to retaliate, she shuffled his underwear down. Flesh twitched to meet her hand, like a beast born for her. She pulled it out. An arch which ended and started inside his pants, framed by the teeth of his zipper. Sizable, almost frightening. But drunk on his finger that moved and conducted the rising fever in her body, she didn’t care. Fondly, if a bit urgent she rolled the beast out. It flicked up against the back of her hand once free. Holding on to his shoulder, she rolled her hips around his knuckle-deep intrusion to transfer her message of need. She saw his own want in his gold eyes, and still, something else was fighting that urge. That something was losing. She wasn’t worried.

  As she contemplated rushing him with words, his finger slid out. She hadn’t finished her gasp when he introduced the long, solid thing all the way through her insides. She could have sworn he was in her stomach. Stretched out and happy, she tried to move. He didn’t let her, holding her up against the mirror as he moved himself. It was a matter of bending his knees and keeping her still for the ascent of his member. She saw none of that, thought of none of that. She only coughed once when it clapped on the ceiling of her inner walls, and breathed with gurgled moans when his pace continued relentlessly. All she did was squirm in his hold, filled and then filled more. Her nipples scratched on the inside of her bra and her nails were at his back. Somehow the bubbling noises from deep in her chest that kept her screams from flying out the door were more embarrassing than the pleasure she tried to hide. Elise didn’t linger long on that ancient modesty, didn’t linger long on anything but the wonderful hardships his frantic length presented to her cunt.

  She had her head against his, forehead to his brow for strength to endure the beautiful test of his cock. Mouth open to breathe on him, she was holding his face when it started to build, that sensation in her flesh surrounding his burning hardness. He was quite alone in holding them up now. Friction solidified the enjoyment high up in her. Urgent in this moment, even when she fought it. She didn’t know what to do, couldn’t ask him to stop, wouldn’t. In a frantic attempt to brace herself before the pleasure-fall she kissed him hard, held his head tightly to hers. Her back buckled toward the mirror to make an arched path for the forceful orgasm. Elise didn’t cling to him, she hadn’t the sense to, but he kept her up for the last of his deep thrusts, following her release with his own warm, welcomed flow.

  As his legs folded to sit them down, her around him and him inside her, she hugged his frame, distantly looking at the waving door, worrying slightly if any of her sounds might have escaped it. Some of her former worries dawned on her now. She didn’t have much strength left, couldn’t escape him if he decide to make her a morsel.

  ***

  Embrell found that his chin felt good against her shoulder. She was still in her jacket. Her scent was overwhelmingly her own, the flavor drowning out his and even Okin’s claim. The Prince’s name in his mind reminded him of what he tried not to be; a creature of passion. Embrell tensed to lift her off him, her and all her pretty perfume, and toss her on her floor; maybe even scold her for making him betray the Prince. She shifted when his cock moved slightly as he turned. He couldn’t. It would be too indelicate.

  “Tell me a secret about your kind.” She asked. She wasn’t back from the high yet. Why not, there were things she should know. He proceeded to answer as his tender flesh softened inside her, leaving room for their accumulated signatures to pour out.

  ***

  “Okin’s kiss makes you addicted to him. My liquids can cancel him out for shorter periods of time. Eventually you will go insane if you don’t return to him.” Elise could see why this would be relevant to her, how it should shock, but she felt quite outside of her usual self at this moment. She lifted her head from his support and turned it back to see if her mirror was intact. It wasn’t destroyed. She smiled lethargically as she laid back on him.

  “Couldn’t you continue giving me your liquids?” she asked and then giggled. Embrell rolled his eyes and there was silence for a while. The door let in some wind. It moved the umbrella she had leaning on the windowsill. It didn’t distract from the flow that kept on leaving her. “Why did you follow me?”

  “Because you found us. I am close to the Prince. I mean to protect him.” Elise thought she heard an old resolve in his voice. He started to move, his slight lifting of her body urging her to move off herself. It felt hesitant on his part. Elise moaned in surprise and n
udged him once, scorned, before she helped in his endeavor. He left a hole in her and she gasped at the sudden absence when she held on to him. Her descent back from pleasure was made real by the mortification of his spill down the inside of her left thigh, rolling forward to cross the cap of her knee. His slacks were open, that beast still hanging out, covered with a thick coat of her moistness to remind of how easy it had been for him to have her. She blamed it on whatever elixir they had in their kisses.

  It wasn’t awkward to find her useless skirt, but she noticed his drawing away toward the ajar opening of her home. Okin had made her feel like this too; stuck and frustrated. He seemed to notice just as he touched the knob. Embrell turned to her, as if he’d been surprised by the output of emotion. She could read the puzzlement between his eyebrows. They were pretty things, these killers.

  “I’m sorry, Ms. Solyana.” he said, as if they only now had met and he had to ask her something bothersome. It was aggravating and incredibly disarming all at once. “I feel as if you want me to stay.” Elise could have sworn she wasn’t worth all those manners when they had met outside. Suddenly she had complete knowledge of her bare lower body and the thickening, hot lines sliding downward.

  “Yes.” she said, defensive before turning, moving over the threshold that would take her from the hall and into the living room. Elise hoped he hadn’t expected more of a deliberation about why he shouldn’t leave after having shared each other like that. For this moment she thought she’d offered enough fodder for his ego that she didn’t need to add a stuttering, exactly half naked, slathered woman to his accomplishments. She held her stomach to calm the phantom pain around the hollow his absence had made when he took his girth back. Getting dressed seemed more pressing than making sure he stayed. For the moment.

  ***

  Elise felt more comfortable now. He sat on her couch and she sat in the chair on the right side of the table they shared. There was an armchair opposite her, at his left, but despite the number of fleeting friendships she’d had over the years, that seat was very rarely taken. Thoughts of replacing the expensive piece of furniture gave way to more pressing concerns. She sipped her tea when he sipped his. Her legs, well covered in gray pants now, crossed to awkwardly lock one foot behind her calf only to return to her default position of knees together, feet down. She cleared her throat with an equally graceless bark, having hoped to hide the general misbehavior of her limbs.

  “I am sorry I stayed for tea.” he said. Before she registered the meaning of his words, she was grateful for the sound. Then she realized and the skin on her face tightened to mask the tinge of insult she felt. Embrell and both of his golden eyes displayed confusion at the reaction she tried to conceal. Then his lips shifted in bent up amusement, apology. “No, I mean I must ask you to forgive me for taking your offer. I didn’t mean that I don’t enjoy your company.”

  Elise laughed slightly, that miniscule hurt still lingering. “I understood.” she tried, quick to fill that witless mouth of hers with more tea. It was scorching hot.

  “No, you didn’t.” he corrected. “And you just burned your tongue.”

  She shrugged, frowned and put her cup down. Why did she even try to say anything that wasn’t the complete, mortifying truth with these creatures? Elise decided to indulge herself from now on; ask what she wondered, answer what she felt.

  “Why would you be sorry, Embrell?”

  “Because it would have been more polite to have the sex and then quit bothering you. Especially since I can monitor you from a distance.” he replied. She leaned back in her chair. The sex?

  “Yes, of course. Nothing like company after coitus to make a woman feel worthless.” Hah. This felt good. Embrell laughed and conceded to her point with a slight raising of his cup. She continued pressing her luck. “Now tell me, what do you mean when you call Mr. Marra your Prince? Is vampire society a monarchy?”

  He sucked on his lower lip, which immediately took her back to memories of its taste. If she had to guess by looking at his features, he wasn’t deciding if he should tell her or not, but how. Her heart felt heavier while beating faster in her chest.

  “Okin.” he started, apparently telling her how she should refer to his Prince. “He is a Prince because he acts like one, is one. It’s much like you would call a leader a leader without necessarily changing his or her legal title.”

  “So he leads your kind because of his winning attitude?” she asked, last syllables pitched, which botched her attempt at sounding smart. Embrell wrinkled his forehead at the notion.

  “No. My kind is divided between many—” He paused, divining among words he knew, no doubt. She assumed they were many and beautiful. “—totems. It’s a little like people choosing lifestyles or religion, but not as concrete.” He must have interpreted her expression as confusion. “Think of it as a combination of the ‘zodiac’ and ‘calling’ concepts you people use.” He seemed pleased at this last explanation and drank to his own glory. Elise chewed on her lip as the information sunk in.

  “So you worship Okin?” she deducted. “Because he is your Totem.” Embrell laughed again and this time she drank, if only to keep herself from throwing the cup at him.

  “We call them Chalice. And no, I serve Okin because I have another Chalice, one whom I agree with rather than worship. The name of my Chalice is Embrell Vellyo.” He waited for her to catch up before he continued. “It’s more of a complete agreement than it is true worship.”

  “So those who have Okin for Chalice will also be named Okin?” she said, the scope of it all clearing somewhat.

  “No. Or it’s possible but I doubt it. I named myself after my Chalice to make things clear when I introduce myself to new acquaintances.” He then looked at her over the fumes from the cup he held below his chin. “Of course, this preparation is lost on humans, no matter how clever, eh?”

  Elise decidedly put her tea down so it wouldn’t end up in his lustrous eyes. The rest of the conversation between herself and the bone skinned, collected, light brunet beast was quite civil, as if he hadn’t given her the most wrenching orgasm she’d ever drowned in right there behind them in her hall. With her door open. But every now and again her cheeks colored and her eyes trailed off to nothing present at all when she couldn’t keep the memory at bay.

  “And that’s the last of the tea, which was gross if you care to know, so I’ll be leaving.” That voice brought her back to her living room. She stood up with him.

  “Oh.” she said, surprised. When she looked down she had to concede that the tea was indeed gone. What should she say? This could easily be his farewell when all she wanted was a goodbye. “I promise not to tell anyone.” she blurted out, sure it would count for something since Embrell seemed obsessed with how abnormal it was for someone outside to know where and what they were. Embrell waved her attempt at conversation away. Her heart sunk further. He started for the door with a strange glance at the mirror.

  “You can talk about that with Okin himself, when you can’t stand it anymore.”

  “Stand what?” she asked, slightly pricked by his innuendo about her lack of strength.

  “Your longing to be drained by him.” She remembered what he had said before, and it made her blood drop a few degrees and stopped her in her tracks. That was right. Inevitably she would go back to Okin. The kiss, the seal. The closing of her door left her to her empty hall, wafted free of whatever scent she and Embrell had conjured by the wall and mirror which had a small, smiling crack now, from the both of them.

  ***

  On Tuesday she went to work as usual. Had her coffee.

  On Wednesday it was hard to get out of bed. She did it all the same.

  The day after was a waning battle between her and the homecoming howl under her skin.

  Then there was a day she took a cab, the last of her rebellious resolve spent on not draining the blood herself, right onto the car floor. Embrell had said it wouldn’t help.

  ***

  Elise knew he
r way to his door somehow, and curled up against it. There were still puffing embers of spite, all reflected in the fury that kept her alive, kept her quiet, but the need to be rid of it and come close to Okin was overwhelming and had been for a long time. It was all alchemy at this point, her eagerness to prove the poison wrong fueled by its effectiveness. Something had to give. Her cheek was pressed against the promising steel that she had yet to knock on. She tried to exist between her painful heartbeats again. Her hand dragged from her knee to scrape her nails up the dress hem until she touched the waistband of her underwear. Eyes closed as her own bracing touch became a livid echo shooting directly from her leg to her cunt. Wet for days. What a primal curse that kiss must have been laced with. She curled her toes in her shoes dreaming of satisfying herself again, to a mongrel silhouette that had Okin’s outlines and Embrell’s spirit. How many hours had she sat with her back to the mirror with only herself and some cheap plastic? She grunted, disappointed at herself at last when she knocked her head back against the hard door. The following beats came from her knuckles when the first had been too dull. He’d come. He had to.

  “You always end up on my floor.” he said after having dragged her in and closed up. Elise didn’t care much about appearances at this point. Her addled gaze followed the carpet to his bare feet. Okin helped her up. Another strike of fever hammered outward over her arms and shoulders. It almost made her crumble. She ran her hand through her newly showered hair. Did he know she had looked decent in dark blue five minutes ago?