by AJ Tipton
Christopher shook his head. "I already ate."
Alice didn't need any further encouragement. She tucked in, each bite better than the last. And yet, there was a sense of emptiness that grew the more she ate, her hunger roaring at her even as she polished off the last strawberry from the fruit salad and licked the plates clean.
"Thanks, that was amazing," she said.
"You're very welcome. There's a lot to love about this life, I hope you enjoy it." Christopher ran a hand up and down her arm. Alice relaxed into his touch.
"No broody vampires on your watch?" She smiled at him, feeling the warmth of his gaze all the way down to her toes.
Christopher laughed. "Exactly." His face lit up when he laughed. He was truly the most handsome man she'd ever seen.
"Have you ever regretted becoming a vampire?" she asked.
Christopher sat back on his elbows so he was lounging next to her on the bed with his legs hanging off the side.
"I suppose every decision comes with certain downsides. I'll never know what it feels like to grow old. The turn of the seasons doesn't have the same relief it used to; the arrival of spring loses its joy when winter seemed to pass in a moment." He touched her hand softly. "I've met so many extraordinary people only to witness them age and die in what feels like the blink of an eye. It's part of what draws me to art: it's how thoughts are preserved after the artists are gone." He sat back, his smile shaky but still there. "But I've never seen the point in focusing on the downsides of my chosen path. Life is just too long to dwell on regrets." He put his hand over hers. "Are you having doubts already?"
"No! I just woke up, and everything is amazing. You've been so kind. I'll remember fondly my first moments as a vampire forever."
Christopher looked away. "I'm very glad."
Alice put down the tray to curl up next to him. "What is it?"
"Just remembering something."
She brushed a stray lock of hair behind his ear. "Tell me." He suddenly looked so sad, so tired that she wanted to wrap him in her arms.
"I was thinking about my brother, Rhys. He and I were turned at the same time, by the same sire. Rhys wasn't a big fan of humanity. Within an hour of being turned, he slaughtered an entire village. Our sire didn't care. Humans were basically ants in his eyes. My first moments as a vampire were spent trying to save Rhys's victims, and I've been doing it ever since." He sat up. "But I refuse to be defined by that." He nudged the tray toward her.
He grinned again, and Alice could see the effort behind it. Damn, I could fall in love with this man. Her stomach sank. That wasn't an option. But everything about him called to her: his optimism and hope in the face of centuries of conflict, his kindness, and his smile. The way the moonlight hit his face transformed him into an angel, and she hungered to climb on top of him and ride his cock until she screamed.
Christopher had been talking for a couple of seconds. Alice shook herself to stop staring at his lips and actually pay attention to his words.
"--shot glasses are all blood from different types of supernaturals. You'll learn in time how to tell the difference between each kind, and how to interpret what they were feeling when they donated. For right now, let’s just start with the basics."
Alice lifted one of the shot glasses and took a sniff. It smelled like soaring skies and fire, like cold scales and strength. She took a deep breath and drank down the shot in one go. A huge sense of power surged through her, and under all that, a sense of peace, joy, and contentment.
"A dragon?" Alice asked. She could barely believe that such things actually existed, and yet she loved how full the world was now since she gained her Sight.
Christopher clapped his hands. "Yes! That's the blood of a dragon shifter friend of mine who agreed to donate a bit for training purposes. She just got married a few weeks ago, and you should be able to smell her state of mind in addition to her species."
"We can really tell all that?" Alice asked. She tried to lean into the feelings that washed over her when she drank, but she couldn’t hold onto them. She sniffed at Christopher. "Why can't I smell your emotions now that I'm a vampire?"
He tapped his nose. "That would work only if I’m human. As a vampire, my blood would have to be in the open air for you to smell it."
"I can barely believe this is really real."
"This and more." He held out another glass. "Here, try this."
Alice felt her whole body go rigid. Fear pulsed through her. She tried to say something, but her jaw was locked. Her hand lashed out, moving against her will toward the shot glass. Every cell in her body demanded that she take the glass from Christopher and consume its contents.
What is happening? She yelled the words in her head, but nothing came out. Her body wasn't her own, her hand moving against her will even as she tried with all her might to force it away from the glass. Her fingers clutched around the shot and she downed the blood in one gulp. A surge of sweetness and flowers and light and sun passed over her tongue, but Alice couldn't savor anything in her terror. As soon as she swallowed, her body returned to her in a rush, and she fell back limp against the bed.
"What was that?" Her voice sounded small and scared. "What just happened to me? I couldn't stop."
"Oh gods, Alice, I'm so sorry." Christopher's words came in an anguished rush. "I didn't mean to. It's the hortari. Even when I don't mean to give you a command, my words require you to do what I say." He scrambled off the bed. "This is why I stay away from the vampires I sire. You deserve your free will, to learn and grow and be your own person."
A knock at the door made them both jump.
"Christopher?" A woman's voice said from the other side of the door.
"Yes, Valerie, I'm in here." He sounded relieved.
A lovely Latina woman with black hair pulled back into a long braid that reached down to her waist opened the door. Her brow was furrowed and her tight-lipped smile looked forced. Something’s wrong.
"Christopher, you need to get to the castle immediately." She glanced at Alice. "We'll look after the new recruit."
Christopher's face paled. He turned to lay a hand on Alice's shoulder. "I'm so sorry that things can't be different. Please feel free to explore as you wish the rest of the house and get to know the lieutenants in my sire line." He spoke slowly, like he was carefully choosing each word to make sure that nothing could be interpreted as a demand. He touched her face gently, like a farewell, and before Alice could say anything, he was gone. Valerie gave her a tight smile and followed after, leaving Alice alone.
Alice lay back against the soft sheets. Her heartbeat still raced. Both Christopher and Margot had warned her about the sire compulsion, but she hadn't realized how scary it would be to lose control of her body. It was terrifying to be forced to act against her will, even for something as mundane as tasting a drink she was planning on drinking anyway. Christopher's sorrow at having mistakenly used his sire power on her was sincere, but could she ever really be comfortable with him knowing that the slightest turn of phrase could strip her of her free will?
For the first time since meeting him, she understood fully why she wouldn't be able to have him in her life.
Alice shook herself. Christopher was right. There was no sense in concentrating on the negative. Life is just too long to dwell on regrets. She had heightened senses and super strength, and could tell how any human was feeling just by their scent.
I'm a vampire!
She certainly wasn't going to spend her first day as a vampire in bed, moping about how the one guy she wanted to be with was the one guy she couldn’t have. Alice quickly got dressed in the outfit someone--probably Margot from the designer labels--had laid out for her and headed out into the rest of the house. She followed the sound of voices through the foyer and down a hallway to a door opening up to the backyard.
She couldn't believe how bright the night looked. With her new vampire eyes, every detail looked as clear as if the sun shone overhead. The wide lawn looked like a set
for a training montage in a Robin Hood movie. Straw dummies stuffed into vaguely humanoid shapes lined the side of the walled compound, their stuffing sticking out from knife and arrow holes all over their bodies. Padded columns serving as punching bags stood in various clumps across the space, along with various beams and gymnastics equipment for balance training.
In the middle of a marked, padded space, Margot and two men Alice didn’t recognize bantered as they attacked each other in a flurry of strikes with five-foot tall staffs. They jumped and weaved around each other, the staffs almost invisible blurs, as they twirled and struck with hard cracks. Alice stared, her mouth open. She’d known Margot was a vampire, but Alice wasn't prepared to see her suave, gallery-owning friend jumping six feet in the air to aim a kick at a guy’s head like an anime heroine.
Margot blocked a particularly vicious head strike and Alice squeaked in alarm. One of the men—a wiry Asian man in tight, leather pants—turned to look in the direction of the noise. It was all the distraction the other two needed to hit him simultaneously on the back and under his knees. He flew sprawling onto the pads.
“No fair!” The fallen man shouted. “Chris's newest sireling is awake.”
Margot leaned on her staff, her smile wicked. “Yeah, and enemies are going to do everything they can to distract you too.”
The man shrugged and jumped to his feet in a single, fluid movement. “Whatever, I’ll just have to kick your ass twice as hard next time.”
The other man, taller with dark skin and chest armor made from overlapping metal gears, laughed. “Danny, that logic makes absolutely no sense.”
“It does in my head, shut up!” Danny said, smiling. He took a running leap which propelled him across the twenty-foot space between the group and Alice. He held out a hand to her. “I’m Danny. Adventurer and lover and forever at your service.”
“Lay off. She’s barely hours old,” Margot said. She walked over to join them, with the gear-plated man close behind. “You’ll make her regret joining our motley crew.”
“Please ignore them.” The taller man said. His voice was deep, with a measured, calm quality that radiated a sense of peace around him. He nodded to Alice, but kept his distance. “I’m Ben.” He shrugged. “I’m the mad scientist of the group.”
Alice stared. Except for the overlapping gears crisscrossing his chest, she would have believed he was a monk before she would ever label him as mad.
Margot punched his shoulder. “Don’t call yourself that!” She winked at him. “You’re the mad genius of the group, get it right.”
“Hey, I thought I was the mad genius?” Danny said.
Margot shook her head. “No, you’re just insane.”
“Oh yeah, that makes more sense.” Danny laughed. “Come on, let’s see what you’ve got.” In one motion, he drew a knife from a thigh holster and threw it directly at Alice’s chest.
Time slowed.
Alice watched the knife coming at her, moon glinting off the metal, the movement so slow it was an easy dance to step away from the point’s path and grab the knife from the air.
The group applauded. “She’s a natural!” Margot cried.
Alice looked down at the knife in her hand, still amazed at what had just happened. She’d snatched a knife from midair. She looked back at Danny.
“You…that could have…”
Danny grinned. “You’re immortal. Even if you were too slow, a knife wound to the chest wouldn’t kill you; it would only hurt like hell. Although, for the record, you should stay away from beheading or fire; those will keep you down permanently.” He walked over to a table covered with swords, axes, knives of several sizes, and a machete. He grabbed the axe and hurled it like a Frisbee at one of the straw dummies against the wall. It chopped the head straight off, the stuffing landing with a soft thump on the ground.
Alice’s stomach plummeted. It might have just been a dummy’s head this time, but what had she signed up for? Did they really expect her to kill someone? She was a photographer!
“I’m not so sure about all this,” Alice said. The table of weapons was intimidating in itself. She pointed at a pile of acorn-sized cylinders that, with her enhanced vampire senses, smelled like harsh chemicals and something else, elusive and tantalizing. “I don’t even know what half of these things are.”
Ben picked up one of the cylinders. “These are my UV flash bombs. Sunlight can weaken us, so I’ve duplicated the effects of the sun’s rays on whatever vampire they hit. These are non-fatal rounds; they just hurt like crazy. With enough exposure, they can knock an enemy unconscious long enough to make a hasty retreat.” He tossed it in the air and Alice fought the instinct to jump away from it. “I’m very proud of these babies.” He handed one to her. “Check it out!”
Alice recoiled away from it. “I don’t know…”
Margot walked up to give Alice a gentle pat on the shoulder. “I know it’s a lot all at once.” She gave Ben a hard stare. “Let’s start off easy before we move up to the pyrotechnics, shall we?” Margot picked up a sword from the table and handed it to Alice. “Try this. You’ve got a swordmaiden look about you.”
“Who do you expect me to fight?” Alice’s hands were shaking.
“Right now? Nobody. But living a life that lasts centuries pretty much guarantees you’ll come across one danger or another. The only expectation we have is for you to be able to defend yourself.”
Alice had to admit, the sword felt good in her hand. The handle was a simple grip with a metal hemisphere protecting her hand and wrist like she'd seen in old Three Musketeer movies. Although it was a solid, three-foot metal blade, she held the weight easily. She whipped the sword around the air a few times, enjoying the swishing sound as it cut the air.
“Hold on there, little vamp, you’re not chopping wood,” Danny said. He came up to stand next to her, rearranging her grip so that her thumb guided the blade like it was an extension of her arm.
Margot picked up another of the blades, standing opposite Alice. “All right, I’m going to show you a couple of attacks.”
Margot was patient with Alice’s many questions as she explained footwork, how to parry, and how to attack, with Danny and Ben giving a running commentary of their various run-ins with past foes. Danny especially seemed to run into confrontations at least once a week, a fact which Ben gently scolded him about.
They both cheered when Alice managed to clumsily recreate a feint, and she swelled with pride. Alice looked between Margot, Danny, and Ben. The connection of their family was so strong, it was like an invisible force joining them together.
This is the best part of being a vampire, she realized. I'm a part of this.
“Oh good, you found them.”
Alice turned toward the voice, and the Latina woman, Valerie, who had called Christopher away joined them in the courtyard. Something in Valerie's expression made Margot's shoulders immediately tense. Margot always played it so cool, Alice found it unnerving to see the gallery owner looking unsure.
Valerie smiled warily at Alice. “Christopher wanted to make sure you made it out okay.”
“He thought she couldn’t make it down a flight of stairs?” Danny asked.
Valerie’s smile widened. “I think our sire just wanted to make sure our newest member was satisfied with her transition.” She leaned hard enough on the word to make everybody chuckle and Alice blush.
“It’s not like that--” Alice started to say.
“Not anymore it’s not,” Margot said. “Christopher’s just too good a guy to bang somebody he has absolute control over. We all know that would be a recipe for disaster.” Her tone indicated the topic was closed, and it was Ben who changed the subject, turning to Valerie.
“What’s the news from the palace? What has Christopher out of here so early?”
Valerie’s grin died. “It’s the king. He’s dead.”
They all started talking at once, their questions overlapping on top of one another.
�
�What?”
“How?”
“When?”
“You couldn’t have led with that?” Danny cried.
“What are we going to do?” Margot said last.
Alice looked between them, her heart beginning to beat faster in alarm. The king?
Valerie held up her hands for silence. “We just got word an hour ago. It was a freak accident at the palace. We told him time and time again not to decorate his walls with ceremonial blades, but the king never bothered to listen to the opinions of others.” Valerie rolled her eyes. “Christopher is headed there now to investigate and confirm the plan for succession.”
“He’s going right now with no backup?” Margot sounded outraged. She buckled the sword to her waist and grabbed a couple of UV bombs from the table. She pointed at Danny. “Come on!”
Danny nodded, and the two raced away.
Alice watched them disappear with a growing sense of alarm.
“What’s going on?” She asked the rest.
Valerie looked at her sadly. “I’m sorry this is happening today of all days. As the king's last remaining sirelings, Christopher and Rhys are the heirs. It’s really a matter of who claims the throne and who can hold it. Christopher is the oldest so he’ll get priority, but…” Valerie paused. “If Rhys becomes king, we’re all very fucked.”
“The king’s death means there’s going to be a war,” Ben said.
Valerie jumped in. “There might be a war.”
“War?” The sword suddenly felt heavy in Alice’s hand. She looked down at the decapitated dummy head. “Now?”
Valerie shook her head. “No, there will be a lot of negotiations and diplomacy first, but the king…” Her voice trailed off. Ben laid a hand on her shoulder. “He was an ornery old bastard who held onto outdated traditions. But he’s been the king for as long as I’ve been alive. It's hard to believe he's really gone.”
Ben twirled a small dagger in his hand, over and over like he couldn’t stop. “It will be all right, you’ll see. Margot and Danny were the first vampires Christopher turned, they’re the strongest of us all. With them as backup, Christopher should be fine.”