by P. Mattern
Absolam, although merely an infant, indeed had the bloodlust.
Carey awakened first, on the morning after the Hybrid attack, aware that in their spooning position his face was resting comfortably behind and above Kimbra’s perfectly white neck. He loved the scent of her, the clean sunshine and wind smell that emanated from her as she slept.
“Good morning Mrs. Floyd,” He said in what he hoped was a sexy sounding half whisper.” I have a present for you!” he teased.
Kimbra stretched like a cat in his arms, her curves undulating beside him as they rested together, and said sleepily, ”hmmmmmmm.”
Carey began kissing her back.
“Are you still of the same mind as you were yesterday sweetness?” He asked, fervently hoping and praying that she was.
Kimbra rolled gracefully around to face him.
“Of course, my husband.” She answered her red hair a halo around her beautiful face.” Today will be the day of our consummation…
…and my deflowering.” She finished a gleam in her eyes.
Carey had to be sure that she would have no regrets.
“It may be costly, K-you may never be able to call up powers as you did when you defeated the Mavesla,”
“I don’t expect that I’ll need them,” she was quick to reply, ”But there IS something I DO need… and HAVE needed for an eternity. You!”
That was all Carey needs to hear. The weeks and months of waiting were over. With peace restored to the Cottage –and Avi away at his new girlfriend’s-they were blessedly alone and undisturbed. Raising his head for a moment Carey also noted the silence outside the walls of their quarters-there was no sign of activity, no voices could be heard.
Jumping out of their bed suddenly he grabbed the sheet on one side and began to pull it down slowly. Kimbra giggled as he deliberately and slowly exposed one inch of her beautiful nude body at a time.
What his eyes took in almost took his breath away.
Kimbra was Botticelli beautiful; her skin glowed with the peaches and cream luster of a goddess. Nearly too beautiful to touch, with her long wavy red hair flowing over her shoulders. She was propped up on her elbows, looking at Cary through half closed eyes, though the unusual green of them shone from under her thick lashes.
“Have you had enough of looking at me, my husband?” She asked in a teasing tone.
Carey let out a long sigh.
“Never!” he answered emphatically.” I could never have enough of looking at you, my beautiful wife.”
Kimbra went to the end of the bed on her knees and pulled Carey’s tee shirt over his head. Then slid her hands inside his boxers on each side, pushing them down.
Then, laughing, she rolled back and made a leap out of the bed, but Carey was too quick for her and caught her around the waist, dragging her back into it, both of them laughing. The laughter subsided as the two lovers kissed passionately and tenderly for several minutes. Cary could feel his heart beating in his ears.
“I worship you,” he breathed softly in a voice several decibels lower than a normal whisper that Kimbra could only hear because she’d been turned. Every touch seemed enhanced, the flesh on flesh sensations that the couple had experienced when human paled in comparison to the ramped up tactile senses they now possessed by virtue of having been turned. Carey covered every inch of Kimbra’s body with kisses as she moaned. He was as the caressing sea and she was the warmed shifting sand at the shoreline.
“Are you sure?” he asked, one more time, knowing that the culmination of their lovemaking would have a cost.
“Yes, oh, yes,” she said, her pulse ramping up and her breathing becoming more rapid.
A sharp cry at his decisive thrust and he was inside of her, and they moved together, experiencing the kind of ecstasy that is only rewarded to lovers who delay their gratification for noble purpose, and then are at last released to each other for hour upon hour without bounds.
Angels sang and rejoiced. The earth moved. Stars shone in the day time… or so it seemed.
It was the best day of both of their young lives.
Ian and Logan had been brother combatants for at least three centuries, the last 60 odd they’d been freelancing mercenaries, working for the V-net and also taking private contracts. They had been fighting the Hybrids in a triad formation at the cottage when suddenly Logan was jerked away by a large thick appendage that had crawled across the cottage flooring that looked like the exposed root of a tree growing at swamps edge. As Logan cried out and his brothers-in-arms Ian and DeMarcus hacked at the root with their swords it continued to carry him toward the open front of the fireplace at the Cottage, portions of it snaking upward and elongating until it was also wrapped around his throat and across his eyes.
As Ian struck at the root with his sword, part of it snaked up and whipped across his open eyes, temporarily blinding him, making him fall backward over the inert and bloodied body of two slain hybrids.
The last glimpse of Logan he had been able to see with his good eye was Logan hanging upside down in the fireplace; his head bound so tightly by the roots than blood was seeping between them. Only the blood soaked hair on the crown of his head was visible at that point, as he hung suspended, as though from a spider’s web, dripping large droplets of blood onto the ashes in the grate. And then, to Ian’s horror, there was a tearing sound as the roots burst through his best friend’s chest, carrying with them Logan’s still pumping heart, which slipped off the end of one of the root stems and rolled, still beating and leaving a viscous trail of ooze, to Ian’s feet.
After a moment of absolute shock Ian had given up a war cry and run toward the almost completely root cocooned body of his friend, but to no avail. Just as he got close enough to touch it Logan’s dangling and bloodied body was pulled upward and out of sight.
Ian had slumped to the floor just then, too shocked and weak to move. A hybrid was about to plunge a dagger into his back when Daniel, resplendent in light chain mail, hacked off the Hybrid’s ugly head with one blow, following that act by twirling around and stabbing another Hybrid who had been creeping up behind him with a dagger.
Charley Rabbit had to admire Daniel’s warfare moves, albeit somewhat grudgingly. Daniel seemed to be fighting with an unexpected fervor, as though he’d taken the hybrid attack personally. Though it stood to reason that Fressenda was his girlfriend now and Daniel would want to protect not only her but also the Cottage, Charley sensed that Daniel’s motivations included something more.
For his part, Charley dragged Ian out of harm’s way, pulling him into a low cupboard where Charley hoped he didn’t succumb to his many wounds before they rest of the vamps could get him medical care.
Orry had also been wounded as the battle waged on-he had been severely blistered on one side of his handsome face by the exploding red dust of the Mavesla, and also only had the use of one eye. Still he’d bravely fought on, his muscular and burnished brown body plunging deep into the fray, killing Hybrid after Hybrid.
When Ian next came to his senses, the battle had ended and he was being transported in the back of a large SUV by a beautiful, dark haired vampiress who was carefully watching him in her rearview mirror as she drove quickly toward the outskirts of the city.
At a traffic light she turned around.
“Hello, Ian, I’m Dendra, Daniel’s mother.” She said, by way of introduction.
Ian felt terrible. Even his eyelids hurt.
“Where are we going?” Ian croaked out.
“Well I’m on ambulance duty-I was only Turned two days ago so I was deemed too ’green’ to fight alongside the others-and our makeshift hospital is the Noble Farm. Have you ever met Mitzi Noble??”
“Yes I’ve met the lady.” Ian responded, beginning to feel all his wounds, mentally begging for the oblivious darkness to overcome him and numb him again and wishing the vampire lady would shut up.
But the vampire lady didn’t.
“I’m Dendra, by the way, Ian. Daniel’s mother, be
lieve it or not…” Dendra’s voice trailed off as she glanced up at her reflection in the rearview mirror. It had only been two short days, and she didn’t look a day over 35. Her skin was somewhat pale but had a creamy glow and her thickly lashed cat’s eyes seemed larger in her face.
‘I’m so beautiful,” she thought, ‘I could have anyone I wanted now.’
Looking back at Ian as he rested against the seating in the back, she noticed that in spite of the blood and grime and deritus of the battle he was a handsome young man, with a mane of golden brown hair that reached his jawline, broad shoulders, a tightly muscled torso and long well-muscled legs. She began to feel a pleasant tingling sensation in her loins as she visually perused the reclining youth.
She wanted him.
Noting that Ian had faded back into unconsciousness again, she sighed with boredom and said to no one in particular.
“Don’t worry Ian; I have the cure for what ails you. And it’s something best administered in person… you won’t even have to get out of bed.”
“AGAIN!” Pierre demanded hoarsely, as Lux moved against him, taut finely muscled flesh against flesh. Pierre found his second release almost immediately, as did his lover, and the two clung together while successive shocks of intense pleasure came in waves, then eventually faded away slowly, like the last sporadic flashes of a brilliant electrical storm. Silently for the next few minutes they clung together as one, stewed in each other’s perspiration and body fluids and luxuriating in the feeling of absolute connection on a cellular level.
Pierre felt Lux’s mouth move against the back of his shoulder.
“I love you, Pierre, mon amour, “he said in a low voice.
“And I you,” Pierre responded, meaning it with all his being. He had never experienced such pleasure and satisfaction, such a feeling of ‘rightness’ in any previous relationship.
Inwardly he chucked as he thought that maybe that was because he’d never been with a vampire before… and that now he was a vampire also. Maybe that had a bit to do with it.
‘Ya think?’ the sarcastic voice in his head replied.
Pierre rolled over and kissed Lux, taking his time, trying to communicate his gratitude. When he finally pulled back Lux was staring at him.
“Do you know how beautiful you are now?” Lux wanted to know. ”Pierre, you were a great looking human, but as a vampire… well the only comparison I can make is – do you remember how all you talked about in the early days of our relationship was how beautiful I was?? Well since I turned you I can’t pull my eyes away from you. Like a Greek god-no, wait, that doesn’t even come close… like a cross between Channing Tatum and Gilad!”
Pierre chuckled. The changes in his appearance after being Turned HAD been astounding, but he was also tickled that Lux seemed to be crushing on him all over again. Everything that had drawn the two men together had become new again with Pierre’s turning.
Especially the sex. The sex was surreal.
Pierre jumped up with vampire quickness and smacked Lux across his perfectly firm, alabaster white behind.
“Let’s get a move on, my decadent beauty!! Didn’t we promise to meet Celeste and Ariel for lunch today?”
“Oh… yeah.” Lux replied, stretching.” Doing anything other than making love feels like such a waste today, you know? Nothing like a dalliance between the sheets to take the edge off battle fatigue!!!!”
Pierre rolled his eyes heavenward, and then gave Lux a pointed look.
“I suppose you want me to tell you for the thousandth time what a stud General you were in the conflict. How you exhibited the strength and courage of a thousand mortal men. How brave and fearless you were in the heat of battle. How your fierceness and valor gave me a woody in the midst of…”
Lux leaned up on his elbows, interrupting.
“Did I really DO that?” He asked, a genuinely surprised look on his face, ”Make you horny in the middle of the battle? Because if that were true it would be really AWESOME!!!” He teased.
Pierre threw a pillow at Lux.
“If I tell you it’s true can we stop talking about the battle?” he inquired, one eyebrow raised.
“Not a chance!!!” Lux chortled.” I MADE you a vampire dude-I am ALWAYS aware of when you desire me!! And, with time, you will be just as attuned to me!”
Pierre stopped still for a moment.
“Sooooooo….” he said slowly,” this is an extremely intimate and invasive connection, and that’s why the decision to Turn someone has such gravity attached to it. It’s a soul connection.”
Lux nodded slowly.
“Yes, it’s a serious matter. A commitment. And can enhance sexual feeling and proclivities between the participating parties in many circumstances.” Lux cocked his head at Pierre, and said in a teasing tone, ”Weren’t you feeling it? Just now as a matter of fact?”
“Oh HELL yeah!” Pierre replied, throwing a pillow in the air above his head until it hit the ceiling. ”I felt it all right-it felt like sex CUBED!”
“But I had a question about that –“ He added, looking puzzled.
Lux was immediately at his side.
“And I am at the ready with answers, my rowdy love! You have but to ask!” He said, looking with fondness in Pierre’s eyes.
Pierre shook his head and followed that by a sharp intake of breath.
“Well I heard it through the grapevine that Daniel Cook Turned his own mother a few days ago-doesn’t that strike you as kind of weird? If not vaguely incestuous?”
New Cass had requested an audience with Mitzi a few days later-he had called her on her cell and asked to speak to her in person privately. There were several reasons he wanted to speak with her-one had to do with the annulment she had filed for. Another reason was that he was starting to experience a creeping feeling of guilt because he hadn’t been to the Farm to check on the infant that he had supposedly fathered-Fress had confided in him that he was not technically the father of Absolam, but she was adamant that he WAS Cory’s father and he had not reason to doubt that. From what he’d seen of the brawny little tyke the boy was the spitting image of himself.
The third reason had to do with a disturbing dream that he’d had recently. New Cass didn’t put much stock in dreams, or even spending too much time deeply in thought for that matter. But somewhere in his subconscious he had a suspicion that his memories might be starting to resurface, and he felt an urgency about checking it out.
Concerning this particular dream, only Mitzi herself could tell him if it were only a dream, or if it were an actual memory.
He had showered, shaved, and showed up promptly for his audience with Mitzi. It was much warmer now, heading into summer really, and he was wearing a bright pink Polo shirt with cargo khakis and Chuck Taylors. He was strangely quiet as he let himself into the underground mansion and traversed up the hallway and through the large ballroom sized family room. He passed Maia in the large room-she was sitting with her feel propped up on an overstuffed chaise lounge reading a book and waved at him as he passed through the room. He felt nervous as he found himself at Mitzi’s bedroom door. It was a third of the way open, and though he couldn’t see inside, he could hear the faint babbling sounds of infants drifting through the opening.
Feeling strangely nervous, he knocked, and hearing a female voice say” It’s open!”, stepped inside.
Mitzi was on the floor of the bedroom, in a patch of what seemed to be sunlight shining through a large ersatz picture window. The infants were on a blanket in front of her, playing with toys as they lay on their stomachs and squealing. As she looked up toward him, her face flushed with pleasure and her strawberry blonde hair in tendrils around her face he was startled at her loveliness.
“Hello Cass.” She said in a polite tone, a tone that she would normally reserve for an acquaintance.
Looking over he saw Buttercup the Wetnurse sitting on the edge of Mitzi’s huge over decorated bed, her short legs causing her feet to dangle like a child’s.
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br /> “Buttercup,” Mitzi said, turning her head to look at the wetnurse, ”Cass and I would like some privacy for a few minutes please.”
Buttercup rolled over so that she could then slide down off the monstrous bed on her stomach until her feet reached the floor.
“Call if you need anything at all,” she said fondly to Mitzi, giving Cass a baleful look as she exited the room.
As soon as Buttercup left, Cass knelt down near the brown curly haired baby who was staring up at him, a baby sized soft plastic barbell full of colored beads in his mouth.
“I don’t think Buttercup likes me very much.” New Cass commented, a tinge of sadness in his voice.
Mitzi looked surprised.
“Oh you mustn’t think THAT-she’s just devoted to me and thinks it’s sad… our situation I mean. She knows it’s not your choice-or your fault.” she finished, picking up the blonde infant, cooing as she kissed him.
“It IS sad…don’t you think? “ New Cass answered. “I’m sorry… I wish I could remember. But, hey, do you mind if I pick up my son over here?” He continued in a hopeful tone, ”He keeps looking at me like he knows me.”
“By all means.” Mitzi answered, scooping up Cory and placing the wide eyed infant in Cass’s waiting arms.
“Hey buddy!” New Cass said, grinning, ”You’ve got great shoulders!!! What a bruiser! Football player for sure!”
The wiggling infant , who even though a mere 12 days old looked like a 4 month old due to the hyper growth accorded vampire infants stopped kicking his feet and looked up at Cass contemplatively.
“Da.” Cory said, then more clearly ”Dada!”
New Cass, astounded, looked at Mitzi, his eyes like saucers.
“Did you hear that? Did he really say that?” He repeated incredulously.
Mitzi giggled, her laughter relaxing both herself and New Cass.
“Yes!! They are both babbling lately and saying a word or two. I think it’s called the” pre-language” stage.
And you ARE his father.” She added, lowering her eyes. In truth, even though she’d closed the door on their former relationship, being near him was causing her body to remember what her mind was determined to forget: how he’d made love to her, held her in his well-muscled arms, kissed her, touched every part of her. She kept her eyes down, willing the rising yearnings of her body to recede, reminding herself that he was not the same vampire that she married.